


Blood is Thicker

by Babykitsune9



Category: Bleach, 史上最強の弟子ケンイチ | History's Strongest Disciple Kenichi
Genre: Brother Kenichi Shirahama, Brother-Sister Relationships, Depowered Kurosaki Ichigo, Eventual Romance, F/M, Female Kurosaki Ichigo, Hurt Kurosaki Ichigo, Loyal friend Nijima, Protective Kenichi, Protective Masters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-01
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:54:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply, Underage
Chapters: 12
Words: 24,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23954914
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Babykitsune9/pseuds/Babykitsune9
Summary: Ichigo has lost her Soul Reaper abilities and her family in one fell swoop.Now she's trying to put the pieces of herself back together and function as best as she can as a normal human- normal, of course is used rather loosely given the fact that she is anything but. Now with an adopted family. Distant relatives that she had never known of before.Kenichi was having enough problems with Ragnarok trying to kill him. And didn't need her to add to his problems.I suck at summaries. This is a Bleach crossover with Fem Ichigo. no pairings yet. suggestions?
Relationships: Ichigo Kurisaki/Kenichi Shirihama, Ichigo Kurosaki/Akisame Kouetsuji
Kudos: 58





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Story actually takes place about two years after the loss of Ichigo's family and powers. However I'd like to clear something up before I go any further- Ichigo doesn't have her Soul Reaper abilities in this story. However she does still possess a bit of her latent psychic ability, enhanced physical abilities from the time spent as a Soul Reaper and even her Quincy abilities. 
> 
> She just isn't aware of them just yet.

Nijima couldn't help but helplessly gape at what he was seeing. He knew that he was in serious trouble when he was captured by Siegfried of Ragnarok, the night prior. However somehow this made everything just seem so much worse. Because instead of Kenichi showing up to save him like he'd wanted, his sister- not Honoka, but the _other_ one- had shown up.

Ichigo Kurosaki, the black sheep of the Shirahama family. And Kenichi's cousin turned adopted sister was standing just a few feet away from Siegfried and Loki, staring the two down as if she'd like nothing more than to bury them in the asphalt that they were standing on.

"Oh this is bad." He muttered to himself since no one was paying any attention to him anyways.

Out of everyone that he'd anticipated as his possible rescuer's from these Ragnarok fiends- she hadn't been expected at all. In fact her presence here was so totally out of left field that it was as if he were sitting on the deep southern hemisphere of space Mexico.

_What the fuck?!_

Kenichi was going to kill him for _somehow-_ unknowingly, managing to drag Ichigo into this crap. He just knew it.

"Who the hell are you?" Loki growled in annoyance as he looked at her.

She didn't bother dignifying his rude question with a response. Instead she looked at him, and Nijima reflexively twitched a little bit at those pretty turquoise colored eyes fixating on him. His heart thudded in his chest, and his mouth went dry and...oh dear god- he'd forgotten that he was butt naked!

 _Please don't let her say anything about how small my dick is_. He thought to himself in a panic as he squirmed a little bit in the ropes that he was bound with anxiously as she pulled something out of her back pant's pocket and held it up. Nijima blinked as he noted that it was her cellphone, and she had it open so that the screen was glowing softly and he could see-

 _Holy shit!_ His eyes nearly popped right out of his skull as he caught sight of what she was showing him.

Did he actually text the message, **_Save me_** , to her? He thought that he'd sent the message to someone else. _Anyone_ else really. Oh god what the hell had he done? He wondered as utter terror took hold of his heart in it's icy grasp.

"I got this message last night and have been looking everywhere for you, Nijima. You look a little bit...rough. You okay?" Ichigo finally said as she flipped her cell closed and then slipped her phone back into her pant's pocket.

"I'm fine!" He shrieked once he was able to finally speak again. Which must have taken him just a tad bit longer than she'd expected, because she had given him a quick once over and was now looking rather...embarrassed.

To see him naked? Or to see him _naked_ and tied up?

He wouldn't lie and say that it wasn't on the tip of his tongue to claim that his current dick size was entirely because of the fact that it was a little bit cool at the moment. But even he could prioritize better than that. His life first, and his dick size later.

Besides, he doubted that she'd believe him if he said anything about it right now anyways.

"But more than that- what the hell are you doing here?! Shouldn't you be at home? Resting?"

Nijima wasn't an idiot. He knew that Ichigo had underwent possible life saving surgery just a week in a half ago, to fix some damage to her heart and was nowhere near healed enough to get into any sort of a fight. Especially with the likes of Loki and Siegfried And to be perfectly honest...even if she could- he wouldn't want her to.

She was the _one_ person in the whole god forsaken world that he would literally die for. The only one that didn't mind his eccentricities, and his plots, and his...somewhat _evil_ nature.

She unconditionally accepted that he was kind of weird.

And he fucking _adored_ her for her odd ability to not give a damn about any of those things and let him be himself. Having someone who could accept him as he was without question; was beyond rare. Not even his own family cared about him _that_ much. And they were his flesh and blood.

"Don't worry none about me Nijima. I'll be fine." Ichigo said, totally ignoring his unsaid- yet hinted at- health condition.

He opened his mouth to tell her to fuck off, but couldn't bring himself to actually be so rude when she'd come all this way for him.

After all, he'd been missing since nine pm yesterday evening and it was around seven thirty pm now. If she had really left her home so soon after receiving his text for help, and had actually searched all over the city for him like she'd said- then she had to be completely and utterly _exhausted_.

And for good reason too.

That was over ten in a half hours of nonstop searching without any sleep or rest. Come to think of it, she'd have to have been pretty frigging _thorough_ to find him in a city of this one's size before twelve hours had passed. And that was pretty damned impressive once one really thought about it.

Especially since statistically speaking, the chances of finding someone like him after being kidnapped, was akin to searching for a needle in a haystack.

Even the police couldn't find missing people quite this quickly. And they had superior numbers and trained search dogs and everything. He didn't know what sort of search grid she had used to find him so quickly but he would certainly be asking about it later.

"So you're a friend of the pointy eared freak, huh." Loki said as he crossed his arms over his chest and looked down at her.

"So what if I am?" Ichigo said in a half mocking tone as she mimicked his stance. Nijima made a small growling sound and then shouted,

"For god's sake Ichigo! Don't pick a fight with these guys! They're members of Ragnarok! They'll hurt you! Just go home, you stupid girl!"

"Shut up Nijima." Ichigo said, her tone was soft. But the underlying hint of steel in her voice made him fall silent as dread filled his entire being.

Loki started to open his mouth to say something- probably wanting him to be quiet too. However the second he took his eyes off of her, Ichigo had him by the throat.

Nijima would have enjoyed the look of fear that crossed the bastard's face, if he hadn't been so worried that Siegfried might jump her from behind or something. However the musician was strangely silent as he observed everything from a few feet away from the two.

His expression was...weirdly curious.

Ichigo smiled grimly at Loki and lifted him up off of the ground, causing the guy to try and break her grasp with his hands and to kick his feet. Nijima's eyes nearly popped out of his skull again when she did this, because _this_ was something that he hadn't been aware that she was even capable of.

And why was that, you may ask?

It was entirely Kenichi's fault. The boy acted as if Ichigo were made of spun glass or something. Why the last time she'd broke a nail the idiot had had a conniption fit and had held her hostage in his room for days afterwards.

She'd had to climb out of his bedroom window when he was asleep just to escape him and his fretting.

Not that Nijima could blame her any. Having Kenichi hovering over you for any length of time would wear on a person's nerves. As it was, he was glad that he'd never been in that position. But then Kenichi didn't seem to like him all that much.

Still, this- this was something that he felt was neccessary. Honestly he felt like Kenichi had cheated him out of vital, need-to-know information about her.

He'd have to bully him endlessly for the next few weeks or so to make the boy grovel for his forgiveness just to make up for this... _slight_ against him.

"I'm only going to say this once," Ichigo said as she lifted Loki just a little bit higher off of the ground. "I'm taking Nijima, and anyone who tries to stop me- will probably bleed to death by the time I'm one with them. Do you understand me?"

Loki kept trying to free himself of her grasp. Nijima could already see where his nails had scratched red lines into her skin leaving little trails of blood behind in their wake. And her legs, though she was wearing pants- were probably sporting all kinds of nasty bruises from his kicks.

Frankly, he didn't know how she managed to keep hold of the guy much less stayed standing while he hurt her. Yet she did. And by the time he'd agreed to let him go, Nijima was crying like a baby.

How could he not? Ichigo was _bleeding_ because of him.

Ichigo grinned in triumph as Loki told her to take him, however her job wasn't done just yet. So as soon as she let him go, she decided to make an example of him. And snapped one of his arms in three places and then while he was screaming and distracted, she lifted one of her feet and brought it down as hard as she could on the side of one of his knees.

Loki went down like a ton of bricks and was writhing on the ground in agony. Not just from his broken bones, but from the possible torn cartilage in his knee as well.

Siegfried looked totally shocked at the sudden display of violence. Probably because he hadn't expected a _girl_ do pull something like this. However he didn't move as Ichigo walked forward and knelt down next to him and carefully untied him and then helped him to his feet.

In fact the guy didn't move so much as a muscle at all even as they walked by him. And Nijima couldn't really seem to focus on anything aside from the scratched up and bloody arm that Ichigo had slung around his thin shoulders, holding him close to her side as they moved away.

"Ichigo," He finally said once they were far enough away to not be heard. "Are you okay? Your arm is bleeding."

She turned her head a little bit to look at him. Her eyes flickering ever so slightly from his face to her arm for a second and then back again as she lifted her hand up so that she could run her fingers through his short hair. "Don't worry about it any, Nijima. I'm fine."

He might have said something else. Maybe suggested that he take her to Ryozanpaku to get looked at by Kenichi's master who ran the clinic. But he felt her lean her head over a little bit to rub it against his own in an affectionate manner and totally forgot everything beyond the fact that he would always, always love, respect and greatly admire this sweet, insanely strong, stupid girl.


	2. Chapter 2

It took Nijima well over an hour once Ichigo got to her place, to grab a shower, some clean clothing, something to eat. Treat and bandage her arms, feed her, make sure that she wasn't in need of a trip to the local ER (because explaining that to Kenichi out of the blue would be more difficult than he cared to admit) had her take some medicine.

Some perscribed for any pain and infection that she might have from her surgery, and something to help her rest comfortably too.

Not in that exact order. But pretty close to it.

And then once she'd conked out on her living room couch to the sound of terrified screams coming from big titted monster victim- He covered her with a blanket and then lowered the volume of the TV so that it wouldn't bother her any and then set out a glass of juice for her. In case she got thirsty at some point.

And then quickly scribbled down a note for her, telling her that he was going out for a little bit, and he _would_ be back as soon as he could.

He needed to find Kenichi and let him know that he was okay anyways. Since he had a feeling that the boy and Miu had both been looking high and low for him and coming up empty.

And even if they hadn't- which was doubtful given who they were- he still felt the need to seek Kenichi out and tell him what had happened. He needed to know that Ichigo might very well have made herself a target now. Especially after what she had done to Loki since the guy would be out for blood.

And steps would have to be taken to protect her.

Setting the note down next to the glass of juice, he paused for a moment to study Ichigo in the dim light from the TV screen and felt a small smile tug at his lips before he then straightened his spine and walked off.

He didn't think it would be right to leave the door unlocked, so after borrowing the spare key that she'd made for him a while back, he slipped out of the house and gently closed the door behind him.

The walk to the dojo was an eerily quiet one with nary a soul in sight anywhere. And at one point, Nijima started to wonder if he was going to see tumble weeds blowing across the street somewhere ahead of him. Honestly he felt as if he were walking the streets of a ghost town.

He'd never seen the streets so _deserted_ before. Usually he would be able to spot at least a half dozen or so people scurrying about trying to get home or something.

It was _disconcerting_ to say the least.

Still, he managed to reach the dojo without any incidents. And once there, he made sure to knock on the gate a few times knowing that one of Kenichi's master's would hear him and open the doors.

It took a few uncomfortable minutes, but the gate finally opened and one of the masters peeked out at him and then shouted excitedly. "Kenichi! Your alien friend is here!"

Nijima, despite his discomfort smiled wanly at the man as he waved him inside the yard. The second that he was inside Kenichi and Miu ran up to him talking at once. Both of them going on about how they had found his clothing, how they had both been worried about him, what did Ragnarok want with him and most importantly- how did he get away?

He didn't say anything for a while. Probably too long, if the concerned expressions on their faces were anything to go by. So when Kenichi took him by the arm and started to steer him towards the house, Nijima finally lost it and started crying again.

Kenichi froze up, startled by his sudden breakdown and looked to Miu and his masters for help. At which point the elder made his way over to the kids and waved Kenichi off and told Miu to go and make him something to drink and maybe get him a snack too.

Once the two of them were gone, the man bent down a little bit and asked him in a very serious tone. "Are you alright young man?"

Nijima took several deep breaths and wiped his face with the back of his hands and gave the old man a miserable look before slowly saying in a slightly shaky tone, "I need to talk to you, the other masters, Miu and Kenichi."

"Is this about what happened when you were taken?" The elder asked. Nijima lifted a hand and rubbed at his forehead for a moment as he nodded his head. "Alright." The man said softly as he maneuvered Nijima into the house and let him sit down wherever he wanted.

The other masters watched him with a combination of curiosity, and concern. Not that he could blame them any. The fact that he'd burst into tears a few minutes ago and wasn't acting like his usual self probably had them worried that he was broken or something.

He waited until Miu was there, just as she had finished setting down a cup of tea and some food for him to snack on before he decided to finally start talking.

"Before we really delve into things, Kenichi- I owe you an apology." He said, catching the other boy off guard slightly. "I owe you an apology for worrying you and Miu and your masters as well. But I also owe you an apology for...for being reckless and thinking that it wouldn't land me in any trouble. But most of all, I owe you an apology for what will _likely_ happen in the near future."

Kenichi looked baffled for a moment as he went on to say, "You and Miu asked me how I managed to escape Ragnarok a little while ago- and I will tell you, it's just...a little bit difficult to put things into words."

"Take you're time Nijima. We're listening." One of the masters- the guy who called himself Kensei said to him.

Nijima looked at the man and gave him a small, grateful smile. Aside from the elder, and the guy with the nearly white colored eyes, the Chinese master was one of the few people present who seemed to genuinely like him and worried about him.

"Alright, so Loki had Siegfried capture me and was talking about stuffing me in a crate and nailing it shut- when your sister showed up."

Kenichi cocked his head in a curious manner and looked at him oddly for a moment as Miu gasped and shouted in disbelief, "Honoka?! She saved you?"

"No! Not Honoka. Do you really think a ten year old girl would stand a chance against those thugs? They'd eat her alive!" Nijima snapped. The ridiculousness of the thought of little Honoka trying to beat those damned thugs up _alone_ and without any form of help or backup was damned near maddening.

Kenichi caught on faster than he'd expected though. The change in his expression was subtle, you had to know what the hell you were looking at to even see it. But his expression had gone from _neutral_ to downright _murderous_ in the span of the blink of an eye.

To be honest, Nijima often wondered if the masters had caught on to the fact that Kenichi practically had a split personality when it came to his sisters. But upon seeing the frowns of confusion on their each of faces, he began to very much doubt that they'd figured that fact out just yet.

No matter. They would eventually.

So he didn't feel any immediate need to point it out to them. At least not yet anyways.

"She's supposed to be home, _resting_ , after her surgery." Kenichi finally said, his tone cold yet furious at the same time. His body tense with his anger.

"I know." Nijima said as he fidgeted with his claw like nails for a moment.

"So what happened?" Kenichi finally asked.

"She showed up, got into a pissing match with Loki- grabbed him by the throat, lifted him nearly six in a half inches up off of the ground. Threatened him. Then when he said that she could have me- she broke one of his arms and probably shattered one of his knees so badly that he's going to need corrective surgery just to be able to walk again. And then stepped over him while he writhed in agony on the ground, grabbed me and then left."

"And that guy Siegfried? Where was he?"

"Right there. I think he was so shocked by the whole thing that he just froze up. Cause he didn't move at all."

Kenich scowled at him, obviously not pleased to hear this as one of the masters put his hand up, drawing their attention to him.

"Sorry to interrupt you Nijima, but could you please clarify something for us?" He asked. Nijima nodded his head and the man then asked curiously. "Kenichi has another sister? As in _more_ than one?"

"Yes."

"How old is she?"

"She's about three, maybe four months or so younger than Kenichi." Nijima replied with a small frown.

"Oh. Alright. Carry on then." He said.

Kenichi made a growling sound of annoyance and then turned his attention back to him and asked, "Is she hurt?"

"She's got some scratches on her arms and some nasty bruises on her legs from Loki trying to free himself of her grasp. But outside of that, she seemed to be totally fine. She's at home now. Resting."

"I should go and check on her then." Kenichi said as he started to get up when Nijima reached out and grabbed his arm, and pulled him to a stop.

"Leave her be, Kenichi. She's sleeping right now. And the last thing that she needs is to have her brother show up unannounced, and flip out on her."

"But-"

"We have more important things to talk about right now." Nijima snapped at him in irritation. "She injuried Loki for heaven's sake, Kenichi! The man is going to be out for her _blood_! We need to think of some way to protect her from them! Especially since she's going to be defenseless while she heals."

"That's going to be difficult." Kenichi said as he sank back down to the floor.

"And just why is that?" Nijima asked him. His dark eyes narrowing ever so slightly.

"Because it's going to take her six to eight months or longer for her to completely heal from her surgery. That is, barring any further complications anyways."

Nijima stayed quiet as one of the other masters asked, "Excuse me, Kenichi. But just what sort of surgery is your sister supposed to be healing up from?"

"Heart surgery." Nijima said automatically as Kenichi deadpanned at the same time. "Heart transplant surgery."

Everyone stared at the two boys oddly for a heartbeat or so before Nijima reached out and grabbed Kenichi by his shirt and shouted in his face, "What the hell do you mean by 'heart transplant surgery'?! When did this happen?"

"Ow! It happened a week in a half ago you idiot!"

"I thought that she was simply having another valve surgery!"

"No! She had a heart attack a month ago and her heart was failing- she had a heart transplant because it was the only option left to keep her alive!"

The two boys scuffled around a little bit before finally managing to pry the other off of them and separating at which point they both sat there on their hands and knees panting for a moment before Nijima wheezed, "I thought that the surgery was the same as before..."

"No," Kenichi huffed as he slowly sat back on his heels. "The doctors decided that they couldn't repair the damage to her heart anymore without doing even more harm to her. So they figured that since it was failing anyways that a heart transplant was the last viable option left to her."

"I wondered what she had been hiding from me lately." Nijima said with a small frown.

Kenichi snorted and then suddenly demanded, "Wait. Why the hell would she be hiding things from _you_?"

"Because I've been staying with her for the last four months. Which you would know if you ever visited her any to check on her!" Nijima growled at him.

"Why are you living with my sister? A-Are the two of you dating?!" Kenichi snarled at him as he glared daggers at his skull.

"Ew. No." Nijima said without thinking and then yelped as he was suddenly grabbed by his shirt again by the other boy and hauled up off of the floor and shaken, _violently_ as Kenichi yelled at him.

"What do you mean by, 'ew, no'? Are you saying that Ichigo isn't good enough for you? I'll have you know that health issues aside, my sister is a solid fifty on the attractiveness scale! She's literally so _pretty_ that it hurts to even look at her. And an alien freak like you would be damned lucky to have her!"

"Let go of me you idiot!" Nijima growled at him as he squirmed in his grasp. "I happen to like your sister just fine. Just not the way that you're thinking."

"Oh." Kenichi said as he automatically dropped him and then sat back down again. "Alright then. So what's the plan to keep Ragnarok away from her?"

Nijima gnashed his teeth and tossed out a suggestion. "I was thinking that maybe she should move back in with your parents and Honoka-"

"She won't do it." Kenichi said with an aggrieved sigh. "She didn't exactly like living with us when she first came home. She's sort of weird about personal space. I also think that she just sort of likes her solitude."

"She is a little bit of a stickler for privacy, I'll admit." Nijima agreed with a nod. "But I think part of the reason that she would refuse to move back in with your parents has more to do with the fact that she doesn't like being fussed over or coddled."

"Yeah, there's that too. She may tolerate it from Honoka, but the last time I tried to coddle her she literally climbed out of my bedroom window and ran for it." Kenichi said looking just slightly _irked_ at the mere mention of the incident. Because apparently he was holding a little bit of a grudge over it.

_Poor Ichigo. He's never going to let her live that down._

"Well she can't be left alone so we need to think of something and fast. I don't know how long it will take Loki to get himself patched up and back out on the streets, but even if it isn't immediately- there's always his lackeys." Nejima said. "And then there's Siegfried. I don't know exactly if he'll be sent after her or not, but I'd rather not risk it."

The two boys lapsed into silence for a moment when the elder finally spoke up, "Why doesn't she just stay here with us?"

Both boys turned their heads to look at the man as Miu said in a questioning tone, "Grandpa?"

"Now hear me out before you both nay say me," The elder said. "But since the young lady has health issues, and is going to be in trouble with Ragnarok- this is the best solution all around. She stays with us and has more than one person watching over her and protecting her. And if she has any further health issues, Akisame and Kensei can be of immediate assistance."

"Ideally speaking that would be a good idea." Kenichi said with a thoughtful look. "She'd have more people with their eyes on her pretty much all the time. Plus we'd be able to re enforce specific rules as far as what she can and can't do while she's healing up. But Elder Haytao, Ichigo is really, really independent minded. She tends to like taking care of things herself. My mom tried to get her to wear a dress once for a family outing- and it was like world war three occurred. It really wasn't safe to walk into my home for like a _month_."

The elder laughed at the oddly serious look on the boy's face as he told them that.

"She's a strong willed girl, huh, my boy?"

"Strong willed would be putting it mildly." Kenichi said. "So would saying that she's as stubborn as a mule."

Nijima merely nodded his head sagely in agreement with him. He had never seen her behave quite like that before, but if Kenichi was trying to warn the man- then he must have seen something truly _terrifying_.

"I'm not too worried my boy. Besides, I think it would be nice to have another girl present. Miu and Shigure might appreciate a little bit of extra female company. Don't you think?"

Nijima and Kenichi both exchanged a look that appeared to be something of a mixture between, _We're screwed_ , and fear before Nijima cleared his throat and said, "If she comes to stay here, she'll want to pay rent and help buy extra food. She'll likely have doctors appointments every few weeks too."

"She also works from home," Kenichi chimed in. "She graduated from school when she was fourteen. So she doesn't go to school anymore. But she does have two jobs. One is working as a ghost writer. And the other is more of a hobby. But they both pay pretty well and she can make her own hours and stuff. I don't think she'll have too much of a problem staying here as long as she can keep herself busy and help out financially."

"Wonderful! When do you want to start helping her move in?" Hayato asked happily. Kenichi gave him a blank look and Nijima sighed and slowly got to his feet.

"I'll talk to her. But just in case she decides to be difficult, someone may have to kidnap her." He said seriously before then bowing to them and thanking them for their time and then leaving.


	3. Chapter 3

The moment that Nijima was gone, Kenichi sighed as his masters all turned to him expectantly. Waiting for him to explain _why_ he felt the need to never mention his other sister to any of them.

"My boy?" Hayato said. Hoping to prompt him into speaking. However Kenichi merely stared blankly at him for a moment and thinned his lips in displeasure causing the older man to sigh. "Will you tell us a little bit about the young lady that we're going to have staying with us? Please?"

The boy sighed but eventually said, in a begrudging tone. "Her name is Ichigo Kurosaki. She's sixteen. She was originally a cousin of mine before her dad and two sisters were killed when she was fourteen. My parents adopted her, because we're literally the only family that she has left. Aside from that, there's really nothing to tell."

The masters were silent for a moment before Miu asked hesitantly, "You said that her dad and sisters were killed? What about her mom? Isn't she somewhere?"

"She's dead too." Kenichi said harshly. "She was killed by some yakuza in a wrong time, wrong place sort of incident when Ichigo was seven. Her dad and her two younger sisters were...all that she had for a long time."

"What happened to her dad and sisters, Kenichi? Is it something that we should know of?"

"I dunno," Kenichi said after a moment or so of careful thought. "As far as I know it was a gang member initiation gone horribly wrong."

"Will you tell us what happened anyways? Just to be on the safe side?" Miu asked in a worried tone. Kenichi looked at her for a moment and then nodded his head.

"Fine. But only to be on the safe side." He muttered before then going on to say, "Keep in mind that this is all the information that I have about the incident. But from what I've been told by my parents when we first found out about Ichigo. She was out helping a former schoolmate fix up her place after it was broken into. Her dad ran a small clinic and her two sisters were home because it was the weekend."

"Sometime between the time that her dad shut the clinic down for the day and her sisters were at home preparing dinner for everyone- several people broke into the house. They were armed, and members of some gang that had been snatching up territory in the area. They...weren't martial artists like Ragnarok's guys. They were...more like petty criminals with rap sheets a mile long. People with incredibly _violent_ tendencies."

"From what I understood of things, her dad tried to protect her sisters and was shot- point blank in the back of the head." There was a collective snake like hiss of anger from the masters as they waited patiently for him to continue. "Her sisters were both, beaten within an inch of their lives and then locked in an upstairs bedroom while the guys decided to rob the place. Ichigo got home around the time they were ripping apart the clinic and tried to stop them. She was beaten, shot three times, and still somehow managed to put up one heck of a fight."

"She managed to fight them off somehow. But when they were running away- one of them had a bottle of highly flammable stuff that he set on fire and then tossed through the window of the bedroom where her sisters were. I was told that Ichigo was discovered outside of the bedroom, bleeding out while her sisters burned alive."

"Ichigo confirmed that she tried to break down the door to the bedroom and get them out, but was too weak from her injuries. She could hear them screaming for help and because she couldn't reach them, she just...collapsed outside of the bedroom and talked to them until the finally went silent... S-She refused to abandon them even if it was to save herself." Kenichi said in a choked tone as he clenched his fists tightly in his lap.

"By the time the authorities arrived, the fire had eaten through the floor of the bedroom and it collapsed. And the fire was spreading. Ichigo was found in the hallway, leaning her forehead against the door to the room. She was still conscious. But only just so. She didn't talk, didn't really react to being carried out of the house before it all went up. Mom and dad told me that she was catatonic for nearly two weeks straight before finally snapping out of it."

"That poor girl." Akisame said softly, his heart aching in sympathy for the yet unknown girl that Kenichi called his sister.

"Indeed." Hayato said quietly as he mulled over everything that he and the others had just been told. And the first thing that he thought, was that while sad- something about what Kenichi had said simply didn't sound right to him. He wanted to ask Kenichi a few things about some of the details that he'd given.

However the desolate look that the boy had on his face kept him from trying to delve a little bit deeper into things. At least for the time being.

They had greater concerns at the moment anyways.

* * *

Three days later-

Ichigo stared up at the massive wooden gate with a weird sense of foreboding and automatically wanted to turn around and go home. The only reason that she stayed glued to her spot was because she wasn't a coward and she didn't run from things. _Ever._

Most people chalked that quality of hers up to stupidity or a lack of common sense. In some cases she'd wholeheartedly agree. Her past pretty much tended to speak for itself.

That didn't mean that she was entirely lacking in common sense though. Because regardless of those things- even she knew that there was something... _monumentally_ life altering on the other side of the gate. She could practically feel it. It was almost like how she occasionally felt the stirrings of her now dormant spirit energy from time to time.

Almost like a hum that was resonating with her soul.

It was fucking terrifying. But she'd seen much worse in the past few years. Still...she couldn't exactly seem to help herself.

That was why she was taking a moment to hesitate and get it out of her system while she could. Once she stepped foot on the other side of the gate, she had a feeling that she wouldn't be afforded many opportunities to even contemplate hesitating again, regardless of whether the circumstances called for it or not.

Taking a deep breath to try and calm the anxiety churning inside of her, she gripped her duffle bag's strap just a little bit tighter and then started to reach out to push at the door- wondering if it was going against the doctor's orders to _push_ something that had to weight nearly seven hundred and some odd pounds, open or not.

She knew that she wasn't supposed to do any heavy lifting. A fact that had escaped her several days ago when she'd gone to find Nijima after getting his text for help.

Her chest _still_ hurt from picking up that stupid asshole by the throat.

But at least she wasn't having to hide the fact that she was having some trouble breathing anymore. So that was a plus. Right?

She wasn't sure how long she stood there. But by the time she was ready to try and push the gate, it had already swung wide open and a tall man with wild black hair, and pale nearly colorless eyes was standing there looking at her curiously.

"Hello, miss." He said politely before then saying. "You've been standing out here for a while now- May I help you with something?"

Ichigo opened her mouth to ask if this place was Ryozanpaku. The place where her adopted brother was studying martial arts at. But all that came out was a weird squeaking noise that embarrassed the hell out of her.

"Oh my, that's a nasty squeak that you have there." He said in what she believed to be a faux concerned tone. "Why don't you come inside and I'll help you get rid of it." He said sweetly as he reached for her.

Ichigo didn't know what possessed her to do it- especially since she had never really done anything like it before. But for some reason she didn't fully understand, red flags were going up all over the place in her mind. So when the guy reached for her, she acted on instinct and slid her duffle bag off of her shoulder, and then chucked it at him. And then turned and ran as fast as she could _away_ from him.

She didn't really care if she hit him with her bag, if he caught it, dodged it- or whatever- just as long as he didn't _touch_ her.


	4. Chapter 4

The moment that Apachai and Shigure told him that there was a girl standing outside of the gate, he couldn't help but wonder if the young lady mentioned was Kenichi's sister. Nijima had given them the green light two days prior, and let them know that Ichigo had agreed to stay with them.

_Reluctantly_ , of course.

Which was more than a little bit understandable given the circumstances. In her place, he very much doubted that he would _like_ staying with total strangers as well. After all, getting used to so many strange people, their habits, and such took time and a lengthy period of adjustment.

It also took a great deal of patience too.

From everyone.

Which was something that he was fairly good at practicing often. So naturally after opening the gate and finding the young lady standing there in a zoned out state, he took a moment to look her over. Noting automatically that she seemed incredibly nervous.

And what was it that Kenichi had said several days ago about her? She was a solid fifty on the attractiveness scale? Seeing her for the first time like this, he had to say that Kenichi's 'attractiveness scale' number ranking for her was fairly accurate. This young lady was in a whole other league that Miu and Shigure in the looks departments.

Her features were exotically _beautiful_.

Wide, turquoise colored eyes that were a deeper shade of blue than robin's egg blue. In fact, up close like this, he could easily see a tint of neon blue in the turquoise of her eyes. Smooth ivory skin, a heart shaped face, soft pink lips, long silky blue-black hair that was cut in layers that fell almost to her waist in feathery wisps that curled a little bit at the tips.

She had a taller than he'd expected, her height was nearly on par with his own six foot two inches. Give or take an inch or so. She had an athletic build similar to Miu's, and even similar curves too.

Her breasts weren't quite as big as Miu's were, but well...she was still fairly young and still had a little bit of growing to do.

Still...she was rather attractive- and he already foresaw Kensei causing her problems in the near future. After all, a beauty like her simply couldn't help but turn heads wherever she went. And the older master was nothing _but_ a great admirer of such loveliness.

_Maybe we should tie him to a post behind the house._ _Like a dog_. He thought wryly as he politely asked if he could help her and noticed an immediate resemblance between her and Kenichi. Not just in her spacy expression, but in the way that she squeaked and then threw her bag at him and took off running.

Automatically regretting teasing her for squeaking since he hadn't expected her to react quite so...similar to Kenichi when he felt overwhelmed or startled- he took a moment to set her bag aside and then took off after her.

He'd say this for the girl, she was fast.

Far faster than anyone that he'd ever seen before. Even Kenichi wasn't as fast as her at running and he and the other masters had been training the boy for nearly seven months now. Still, the speed at which she was moving was concerning to him.

As someone who had recently gone through a major surgery, she shouldn't be exacerbating her condition like she was. The more she ran, the harder her heart and lungs worked.

And he _knew_ that she had to be in a considerably amount of pain already.

Still, part of him couldn't help but be somewhat impressed by her. Even in her present condition- she showed a shockingly high pain tolerance as well as stamina and speed.

_Maybe she was a fighter_. He thought to himself, just a tad bit intrigued, as he continued to follow her one block, two- seven... _What the hell?_ He wondered curiously as he kept following her another six blocks. Frowning darkly at the fact that she was hurting herself more and more with each step she took.

He'd chased her nearly all the way across the city in the span of three in a half hours. And she still wasn't showing any outward signs of strain, pain, difficulty breathing, or slowing down.

It was _amazing_ really.

There was no other reason that he could think of- that she could have run all this time without passing out or collapsing. Especially given the amount of absolute agony that she had to be in by now.

Finally, she had no choice but to stop running- her chest hurt so badly that she could barely breathe, her body felt weak. Almost as if she had been sucked dry of any energy and strength that she had previously possessed and dark spots were dancing in front of her eyes.

She only managed to take several more clumsy, staggering steps before she finally felt her legs suddenly go out from under her, and she started to fall.

He managed to catch up to her quite easily then, his arms sweeping her up against his chest before she could even hit the ground. Once he had her in his grasp, he shifted his hold on her body just a little bit so that he could check her pulse and nearly swore- _loudly_ , and very vulgarly- when he realized that her heart and lungs were working far too hard.

Honestly with as much distress as she had placed herself in, it was a wonder that her heart and lungs hadn't totally failed her just yet.

As it was, he was going to have to run as fast as he could back to the clinic and see what he could do to slow her frantically beating, overworked heart.

* * *

Kenichi had just walked out of the work room that he and Miu had been setting up for Ichigo to use when she got there so that she could actually have a place out of everyone's way to do her work whenever she needed to. And was heading to the kitchen to grab himself a drink when he caught sight of Kensei peering over one of Shigure's shoulders as she rummaged through what looked like a duffle bag of some kind.

"Hey Kensei, Shigure- what are you doing?" He asked as he moved closer to them.

Kensei looked up and blinked at him before replying, "Shigure found this bag lying just inside of the gate a little while ago and now she's looking for some sort of ID or something. So that we can figure out who lost it and try to return it to them."

"Oh?" Kenichi said as he wandered a tad bit closer to the two and peered over Shigure's other shoulder just in time for her to pull out a white and pastel pink, blue, and purple polka dotted bra that looked weirdly familiar to him. "Hn, that bra looks like the one that my mom picked out for Ichigo a few months back." He said, more to himself than either of them as the two master's looked at him oddly before Shigure asked in a suspicious tone.

" _Why_ would you know what you're sister's bra looks like?"

"Oh, I was with my mom when she got it for her. So I sort of saw it before she put it away."

Shigure seemed to buy that. Kensei however was another story entirely.

"You mean that you didn't go through her underwear drawer?"

Kenichi balled his hands into tight fists and growled at the man, "Ew, she's my sister- you disgusting old man!"

The man simply chuckled in amusement and shrugged before saying. "That's fair. I thought I'd just check though. You never know with _some_ nowadays. Hormones make blithering idiots of many, my boy."

"Again, _ew_." Kenichi said as he tried to fight back the urge to drive his utter disgust at the mere idea of perving on Ichigo, home with the man by punching him in the face.

He was about to walk away and leave the two masters to their weirdness when Shigure made a chirping sound and held up a plastic baggie full of pill bottles. "Found something!" She said in triumph before then asking, "Who's...Ichigo?" Causing Kenichi to freeze up and quickly snatch the baggie from her hand and look at the medicine bottles label's for a second before screaming.

"Ichigo! Oh no, where is she?!"

"Oh, so I guess that young lady was her after all." Kensei said in surprise as he went on to say. "She must have been very nervous about being here. Akisame went to see if she was lost or something and she panicked, threw her bag at him, and then ran off. Did you know that she could run that fast? I swear the girl was kicking up a dust trail like no one's business."

Kenichi blanched and stared at the man for a heartbeat before quickly running out, of the still open gate, _screaming_ the girl's name.

Once he was gone Kensei sighed and muttered, "Stupid boy. Akisame should be back any minute now with the girl."

"Do you think she's okay?" Shigure asked curiously. "She and Akisame have been gone for a while now..."

"I hope so. Otherwise Kenichi isn't going to get much training done for a while." The man said as he tugged the brim of his hat down a little bit and then reached out and grabbed the plastic baggie of pill bottles up from where Kenichi had carelessly tossed them before he had run off in a panic and said, "I'm just going to go get the clinic ready just in case. Would you please take the duffle bag and everything in it to Ichigo's bedroom."

Shigure nodded her head sagely as he smiled at her and then walked off.


	5. Chapter 5

Kensei had just finished preparing the oxygen tank and pulling the defibrillator over to the nearest cot when Akisame finally made his appearance. And man, oh man did the other man ever look upset. Sure to the casual observer, he looked the same as he always did.

But to someone who'd known him for years, it was literally all Kensei could do not to move _away_ from him.

He'd never felt anything quite so...so _terrifying_ before. And he'd been around long enough to witness several of the others losing their cool and flying into rages before. Including the elder.

But none of them and their rages had ever inspired such a terror-stricken feeling of utter dread in him.

Akisame moved quickly once he was through the door with the girl. Kensei could see that she was in a bad way by the nearly chalky white parlor of her sweat dampened skin. She was unconscious, her head lolling back on her neck at an alarming angle, and her breaths...

He'd only heard such difficulty breathing from people with deadly, _severe_ cases of pneumonia, or lung disease.

Laying her down on the cot that Kensei had prepared, Akisame grabbed the oxygen mask and took a moment to fix the knob on the tank and then covered her face with it before then quickly telling him to grab some medicine's from the medicine cabinet across the room.

He was specific about what he needed, and Kensei wasn't about to argue with the man. He simply wasn't stupid enough to argue with him while he was this upset. Akisame would tear him limb from limb if he wasted his time arguing with him when he could be getting what the man needed to help stabilize the girl's condition.

It took both men working together less than ten minutes to get Ichigo comfortable enough to rest normally. And that was mostly due to the fact that Akisame had injected her with a weird cocktail of pain killers, sleeping meds, and something else to slow her heartbeat so that it wasn't beating quite so quickly anymore.

Once Akisame was sure that she was finally resting, he sighed and quietly moved away from her.

"Is she alright?" Kensei asked worriedly.

"She is now. But she'll have to stay on bedrest for a few days because of this incident."

Kensei hummed as he watched his friend run a slightly shaky hand through his dark hair before saying, "Kenichi will be beside himself with worry once he finds out about this."

"Kenichi will just have to get over it." Akisame said with an audible bite of menace to his tone. Upon realizing how he must have just sounded to Kensei, he softened his tone a little bit and then said. "Besides, I plan for you, Appachai and Sakaki to keep the boy busy with training."

"Oh sure, foist the boy off on us why don't you." Kensei said dryly before glancing back at the girl again. And sighed upon realizing that Akisame would likely be too _busy_ to bother with training Kenichi for a little while and then shrugged as he said, "Oh well, I suppose that if all else fails then one of us could arrange for Shigure to take him out into the woods and hunt him for a few days."

"I bet the Hayato would like that. He doesn't have enough entertainment to occupy his time as it is."

Kensei gave him a slightly evil smirk. "Shigure would like it too. You know how she likes to use people for target practice."

Akisame grunted as he pulled his chair back away from his desk and settled himself in it. He was likely going to spend the next hour or so observing Ichigo, and keeping a close eye on her present condition before he'd make any attempts to move her to her bedroom to rest more comfortably for the next few days.

In the meantime, he supposed that he could keep himself busy checking over some of his equipment and supplies and making a note of what he would need to buy/replace soon.

Seeing that Akisame's thoughts were preoccupied for the moment, Kensei quietly excused himself to go and see what the others were up to and maybe tell them what had happened so that they could be aware of Ichigo's present condition.

* * *

Ichigo only woke up _once_ in the two in a half hours she'd been in the clinic. And it only happened because Akisame was in the process of moving her to her bedroom.

And he accidentally wound up jostling her a little bit without meaning to. As a result, she'd given a full body jerk in his arms and her eyes flew open in alarm. And then she'd looked at him as if she'd like nothing more than to tear his head off and toss it down the hallway.

Honestly it really was a _very_ mean look, and if he were anyone else he might have actually been afraid. However he wasn't. So the look had absolutely no effect on him whatsoever.

He merely chalked the look that she given him up to being upset over being awakened so suddenly, possibly because she was a grumpy person when awakened, and decided to ignore it. Soon after which she slowly began to relax, lay her head back onto his shoulder where it had been previously and then closed her eyes again.

Several moments later, he was slipping into her bedroom and laying her down on the futon that had been bought for her to use as a bed while she stayed at Ryozanpaku.

Once on the futon, she automatically curled up on her side and sighed as she buried her face in the pillow that had also been provided for her, while he took a moment to slip her shoes off of her. And then once that was done, pulled the cover up over her so that she wouldn't catch a chill and then started to get up and leave her alone to sleep for a little while.

He was already planning to have Miu come up in a few hours to help her change into some night clothes, and see if she could maybe feed her something before he gave her the next dose on pain meds. And was almost to the door when he heard her ask very softly, "Who are you?"

Pausing just before he slipped out of the room, he looked back at her wondering if she were sleep talking. Since sleep talking wasn't exactly all that unusual an occurrence for the residents of the dojo, he figured that there was no harm one way or another if he answered her.

It wasn't like she was still totally conscious so she probably wouldn't recall anything that he said to her now, the next time he saw her anyways.

"My name is Akisame. I'm one of your brother's masters." He replied and then waited a moment to see if she would say anything else when she asked.

"Safe?"

It was a strange thing to ask someone. Especially if one was simply sleep talking. But the question caught him off guard and made him turn to look at her for a moment. He felt...torn here. And was uncertain what he should do in regards to the question.

Part of him wanted to reassure her that yes, Ryozanpaku was _very_ safe. And she was thereby safe by extension. However he also sort of wanted to go and get Kenichi and see if he could somehow help to reassure her. Actually, maybe that wasn't the worst idea in the world at the moment.

The boy was her brother after all.

 _"Safe?"_ She asked again, this time managing to crack an eye open a sliver and look at him from over the pillow. He swallowed past the sudden lump forming in his throat and nodded his head, _yes_. Her eye closed again and she fell silent, this time he realized that she was completely asleep again.

He stood there for a moment longer, just in case and merely watched her for a heartbeat or so before then deciding that he'd overstayed a bit too long, and then left the room.


	6. Chapter 6

The resident's of Ryozanpaku began to walk on eggshells later that evening.

Especially after Kenichi had finally returned from searching for his sister, and found out about how she had made herself worse off than she had been. And then appropriately flipped the fuck out on them _all_ before then scampering off to check on her.

He wound up holing himself up in her room for the night. Which wasn't totally _uncalled_ for nor _unexpected_ given how attached to her the boy seemed to be.

But it was somewhat worrying when Miu went up to try and feed Ichigo and change her clothing, and was promptly and somewhat rudely shoved out of the room by Kenichi. Sure he apologized for the abruptness of the action, but Miu still cried over it a little bit.

Which seemed to upset everyone just a tad bit more. After all, Miu was a good girl. And it was uncalled for Kenichi to treat her so coldly. Especially when she had just gone to Ichigo's room to help.

Akisame wound up not being able to sleep a wink after visiting the bedroom again a little while later to give the girl another dose of pain and sleeping meds. And decided to try and ignore things for the moment. Not just because of Miu's hurt feelings and Kenichi's odder than usual behavior.

But because he kept hearing Ichigo asking, "Safe?" over and over again in his head. He couldn't quite put his finger on the reasons _why_ , but the question kept bugging him.

Almost as badly as how she'd reacted to his presence when he'd tried to talk to her yesterday.

Contrary to how he seemed able to simply shrug most things off. Her reaction to him hadn't been normal, at all. In fact it had practically screamed; _danger, panic, escape,_ to him. Which was _unusual_ in and of itself since normal most people tended to find his presence very calming and soothing.

It was incredibly _rare_ for a normal person to bolt from him as if the hounds of hell were nipping at their very heels. So naturally he found this as troubling as he did curious.

 _Could it be a genetic thing?_ He wondered curiously.

After all, Kenichi ran from him all the time. But then the boy usually thought that he was trying to kill him with his weird training methods. Which he would admit, _were_ pretty odd and incredibly dangerous. And very well may have contributed to Kenichi's fight or flight instinctive reactions to sensing danger _more_ than just a little bit.

The house was still quiet once morning rolled around. Probably because everyone else had had some trouble sleeping as well. So no one was around when he finally decided to leave his hobby room to head towards Ichigo's room to check on her.

He was walking along the porch when he saw something...weird.

There, sprawled on the porch, illuminated by the pale pink-orange light filtering through the trees- was Ichigo. Pausing in confusion, because he couldn't possibly be seeing what he thought he was. Akisame stood there studying the girl with a slightly puzzled look on his face.

She looked as if she'd made a nest of some sort out of a nice thick blanket and was simply lying there on the wooden porch dozing in the soft, welcoming light of the early dawn.

However she was supposed to be in her room. On bedrest. _How the hell did she even get out here anyways?_ He wondered in total bafflement as he cocked his head a little bit to the side.

It wasn't as if she'd had any time to explore the house or the grounds any yesterday. And if she had been up and moving around sometime during the night one of the others would have heard her and notified him _immediately_ so that he could nip that in the bud before she managed to do herself anymore damage.

But since he hadn't been informed by one of the others...obviously someone had dropped the ball here. The only question that he had at the moment was _who_? Because that person had just earned his wrath for allowing Ichigo to place herself in danger again by letting her move from her bed to come here.

Sighing, he knelt down next to her and reached out to put his hand on her shoulder- however before he could touch her, she twisted her head in his direction and snatched his arm by his wrist in a lightening fast move that was more than just a little bit startling.

Honestly, he'd never had anyone grab him so quickly before. She moved so damned fast that he hadn't even been able to track her hand until he registered her fingers around his wrist.

He'd _never_ had that kind of problem before with another person before. Not even when he sparred with one of the other masters. And each of them had the kind of reflexes that could only be described as god-like.

So naturally having someone who was injured and didn't seem all that threatening at first glance grab him so suddenly like that- made him freeze up and quickly try to analyze his situation just in case he'd suddenly found himself in something that qualified as 'trouble'.

Almost as suddenly as her hand wrapped around his wrist, she let him go.

Which was...puzzling.

Now don't get him wrong, he was happy that he had his arm again. Especially since under normal circumstances, he'd wind up having to fight someone to get it back. Like the last time Appachai got sick, for instance. The muay thai master had grabbed him while delirious with a fever and he'd had to actually fight him to get him to let him go.

Of course, Appachai didn't recall any of this. And he wasn't going to tell him and chance having the man feel badly for the incident.

So he didn't question the fact that she had released him too much as he pulled his arm back and simply eyed her slightly warily as she slowly pushed herself up into a sitting position while somehow managing to keep her blanket wrapped around her.

"Mornin." She muttered in a low sleepy sounding voice.

"G-Good morning." _Oh god, why did I just stammer?_ He wondered in utter mortification as he watched her while she rubbed the sleep from her eyes before then dropping her hands again as he asked. "What are you doing out here?"

"There was a cuddler in my bed." She said the word 'cuddler' in a slightly disgruntled tone. Almost as if it were a curse. Which was weird, especially since most girls her age didn't seem to mind all that much if they were cuddled by someone close to them.

He didn't know why, but he found himself chuckling in amusement since she was obviously talking about Kenichi. Unless Nijima had somehow managed to sneak into the house under the cloak of night and mysteriously escaped Shigure and Appachai's notice.

Which he seriously doubted. So it had to be Kenichi that had driven her out here.

"I see. Kenichi chased you out of your room, huh? But that doesn't exactly explain how you managed to get out here without someone coming to get me."

"The window." She said as she tried to bite back a yawn and failed.

He frowned at her and tipped his head back a little bit as he tried to recall the exact placement of the house's windows. He knew that almost all of the bedrooms on the second floor had them. And he knew that Ichigo's room had one.

"Did you climb down from the porch roof?" Because if she had- then she hadn't gone out of _her_ window. Which meant that she must have gone out of another one. But which one?

"Yeah. I was sort of in a hurry," He thinned his lips in displeasure because she wasn't in any condition to be climbing out of anything, much less wandering around on her own. "I needed to get out before Kenichi woke up and spotted me." She finally tacked on in an abashed manner.

"I see." He sighed as she tilted her head back on her neck a little bit and looked at the sky for a moment.

"I was thinking of cooking breakfast for everyone today," He blinked at her. Uncertain about what to say to her idea since he wasn't sure if she was telling him so that she could get his opinion or not. "But...I'm not sure what sort of stuff everyone likes to eat."

"That is a little bit of a pickle. But no one here is particularly picky when it comes to food. However, if you do decide to try cooking for everyone, then you'll need to have someone present with you in the kitchen." He said as he slowly stood up so that he towered over her for a moment.

She looked at him blankly and he quickly elaborated by saying sternly, "No heavy lifting. And no more running either. You nearly gave yourself a heart attack yesterday. So you need to take it easy as much as you can."

"Oh. Alright." She said, and then looked away from him for a moment before he asked her.

"Do you need some help getting up?"

She blushed and simply nodded her head as he reached down and gently pulled her up to her feet and then re wrapped her with the blanket since it had slipped from her grasp when he was helping her up. Once it was back in place around her shoulders he took a step back away from her and then looked at her expectantly. Apparently trying to figure out her next move when she huffed at him and then asked him where the kitchen was.

He pointed and she turned and started walking, and he simply feel into step behind her. It would seem that since he was the only person up at the moment that he was on kitchen duty.

 _Great_.


	7. Chapter 7

A little while later, Akisame was sitting at the counter in the middle of the kitchen, watching her as she cut up some veggies to go in a side salad with a carefully masked look of amazement on his face.

She'd really gone all out making everyone's breakfast. He didn't think that he'd ever seen so much food at one time before in all his years while living at Ryozanpaku.

To be perfectly honest, he'd been a mite worried about her stepping foot in the kitchen at first. And not just because of her present condition either. Though the fact that she'd have to use some heavy pots and pans had worried him a smidgen. No- He'd been worried about what sort of a cook she might be.

But once she got started she was _shockingly_ good at it. Maybe even a bit more so than Miu herself.

And after she had a good feeling for _where_ everything was, she went to work with a strange singlemindedness that he found that he actually envied a little bit.

She'd already made a enough fluffy pancakes, tamagoyaki, bacon, some honey and ginger okayu, some homemade strawberry, green tea, vanilla and ginger spice flavored awayukikan, cinnamon rolls. What appeared to be a shrimp salad of some sort, teriyaki steak, some stir fried vegetables... All of which weren't even _breakfast_ foods.

In fact some of them looked like dinner and lunch foods.

But they all looked and smelled delicious anyways.

However those that were made for breakfast there were more than enough for all of them to have second helpings of all of the dishes. And knowing Apachai like he did, he would want a little bit of everything that he could get his hands on. Sakaki and Hayato maybe would to.

He might as well. If for no other reason than to sate his curiosity. But he couldn't speak for the others though.

Frankly he'd never seen someone work their way around a kitchen quite like her before. And the easy way that she managed everything without asking for him to help her much bespoke of years and years of solitude and having to do everything for herself.

Perhaps from the time she was a small child.

He wasn't sure that he liked the idea of her as a little kid trying to fend for herself. I mean it was one thing for Miu to fend for herself as a little kid, her grandfather would have kept a close eye on her to prevent her from potentially hurting herself while she learned a valuable basic life skill.

Ichigo though, she'd _had_ parents. Or at least one of them anyways.

So how had she learned to- He stopped his train of thought there and found himself asking, "Do you like cooking Ichigo?"

She looked up from her task for a moment and blinked at him before slowly returning her eyes back to the items strewn about the counter and replied. "Not really."

"Oh? I was just wondering because you seemed to be cooking for an army." He said as he pointed to the mountain of different dishes piled all over the counter. She froze for a second and scanned them all and then went right back to cutting stuff up.

"Are you having fun, making a mess?" He asked in amusement.

She shrugged her shoulders a little bit, and visibly winced as her chest throbbed a bit. He noted the action and started to ask her if she was alright, but she cut him off by saying. "Who wouldn't have fun cutting something up." He snapped his mouth shut and blinked at her for a moment as he thought, _Well okay then._

So she had a Shigure-esque personality.

He wasn't quite sure how to react to this little bit of information, so he didn't bother to. Though he supposed that if he wanted to _really_ find out just how Shigure-esque her personality was he could just sic Kensei on her and see how beat up he got. If nothing else it might be somewhat entertaining.

Though something told him that she wouldn't bother to pull her punches like Shigure usually did. So he decided to file the information away in the back of his mind for the time being and try to focus on something else.

"Will you tell me a little bit about yourself?" He asked after a moment or so of silence. She looked up at him again. Her face going blank of any visible thought or feeling as she asked warily,

"What do you want to know?"

He studied her for a moment, curious as to how she managed to put on such a poker face. Her expression was so difficult for him to read that it was just a little bit concerning to him. After all, he prided himself on being able to read a person easily.

"Well, what was your childhood like? After your mother died?"

"Difficult." The curtly spoken word should have put him off of asking her anything else. But weirdly enough it simply made him want to know more. He looked at her expectantly and she made a frustrated little sound, likely becoming irked with him before then asking, "What exactly have you been told? About me? My family and stuff?"

"Not much. Just that your mother died when you were young and the rest of your family passed on several years ago."

"The bare bones of things then." It wasn't a question. Merely a fact.

"Basically, yes."

She sighed and lifted a hand to rub at the bridge of her nose and seemed to be thinking for a moment before saying, "Dad crawled into a bottle the same day that mom died. He never really managed to drag himself out of it again."

"Did he stay drunk often?"

"More than I can accurately recall." She muttered.

"So who took care of you and your sisters?"

"I did."

"That must have been difficult given how young you were as well."

She shrugged again, "It's not like dad was going to do it. When he wasn't working in the clinic, he was drunk and lying somewhere in the way. I can't tell you how many times I tripped over his sorry ass while trying to clean or something. Nor can I tell you how many times I wound up spraining a wrist or ankle, or breaking a bone or two because he was too drunk to move out of the way."

He inwardly cringed a little bit in sympathy and asked what she did to take care of her sisters. Deciding that the topic of her drunken father should be dropped before she got angry.

"Tell me about your sisters. What were they like?"

"Well, Karin- she was the second oldest. And she was a tom boy. She fought, played soccer, baseball-"

"She sounds like she was a little hoodlum." Akisame said as he propped his cheek in his hand. Ichigo had a pretty smile on her face. Her turquoise eyes glittering with happiness.

It was incredibly easy to tell what she must have felt and thought about her sisters. The two younger children had been a small part of her entire world. Losing them much of hurt her terribly.

"She was. Yuzu however, was a little lady. She was...kind of old fashioned. She incredibly sweet, softly spoken, well mannered and lady-like."

"They both sound as if they were wonderful children."

"They were," Ichigo said. Her smile dimming a bit. "I've only met a few other people who were almost exactly alike them."

"You gravitate towards people similar to them." It wasn't a question. Merely a statement of fact. Ichigo blushed prettily and fell silent for a moment before saying wistfully.

"Yeah. I do. But it isn't just because they remind me of them or the fact that I miss them," She said as she finished up what she was doing and finally set everything aside. "It's because those people are genuinely good people. And I guess I'm just fond of the type."

He smiled and was about to ask something else when Sakaki poked his head into the room and asked nervously, "A-Are we going to eat anytime soon? I think the elder and Apachai both have just died from starvation."

Both he and Ichigo looked at the man oddly before he sighed and then told him to grab some of the breakfast dishes and go ahead and take them out to the dinning room. Sakaki didn't bother to make any protests about carrying the plates out. Which was a little bit usual for him.

But once Akisame finished grabbing some of the left over plates and began to carry them out- he quickly realized why. Both the elder and Apachai really did look as if they'd just keeled over dead.

Shigure, Kensei and Miu were all freaking out and trying to revive them.

Growling in annoyance because Apachai dying of hunger was one thing, but Hayato's attempt at humor was terrible- Akisame made his way over to the table and unceremoniously stomped on the elder's stomach as he was reaching over to put the plates in his hands down on the table.

The elder wheezed and jerked himself up and looked at him with wide, startled looking eyes as Akisame smiled sweetly at him and then walked off to grab Ichigo so that she could eat too.


	8. Chapter 8

Kenichi was a tad bit late joining everyone for breakfast, so when he walked in on Apachai enthusiastically shaking one of his sister's hands- and automatically getting fussed at by Sakaki, Kensei, Miu, and Akisame for it because he was shaking it just a _little_ bit too hard. Ichigo kept wincing and hissing while he trying to tell her thanks for resurrecting him from the dead with her cooking- so he was only a little bit lost.

But not terribly so. After all, it only took one look at the table full of foods to know what his sister had been getting up to this morning after she'd escaped his squid-like clutches.

Taking a seat on the floor next to Ichigo, he quickly made himself comfortable and cast her an bemused look as he asked, "You cooked this morning?"

She blushed and quickly ducked her head so that no one would see how embarrassed she was by his question as Kensei said, "Yes, she did. And we waited as patiently as we could for her to finish up so that we could all eat together."

Akisame snorted and muttered something along the lines of, "Patiently my butt." And sent a small glare in Hayato's direction as the elder laughed.

"Good morning Kenichi! You're sister is quite the cook, isn't she? Just look at this amazing feast!"

Kenichi nodded his head slightly as he took a small experimental bite of something and smiled as he said fondly. "Yeah, she is. Though she doesn't do it very often."

"Really?" Miu asked, looking almost shocked to find out that the other girl doesn't bother to cook often. She couldn't imagine what she would do if she didn't at least spend several hours per day in the kitchen, herself. Of course this was barring the knowledge that her grandfather and the others would _actually_ die of starvation if she did.

"Ichigo I can't believe that you don't like cooking. Everything here is so delicious!" Miu said as she took a bite of one of her strawberry flavored awayukikan and made a happy sound, as if to emphasize her point.

"I agree." Kensei said between bites of his own food. "Being able to cook like this is a gift, my dear girl. You'll make some lucky guy a wonderful wife one day."

Kenichi paused eating for a moment at Kensei's praise and cast a look towards Ichigo who had scrunched up her nose in disgust at the very idea of marriage. Which would have been funny if not for the fact that Ichigo had absolutely _no_ intention of ever letting herself be snatched up by some shmuck guy.

As it was her mentality towards romance was more than a little bit akin to that of a little kid that had just found out that boys had cooties. She may not run screaming from anything male, but that didn't mean that she like- _liked_ any of them. In fact he wasn't even sure if she knew what to do with a guy who showed her any romantic interest.

She seemed to tolerate them at best. And that was on a normal day. Worse case scenario- she probably thought the lot of the world's male population of as _girls_ with penises. Actually...that one made a lot more sense to him than the cooties thing.

However he made the mistake of mentally picturing what each of the masters would look like as women and wound up choking when he accidentally inhaled a bite of food while simultaneously trying to laugh. And wound up with it going down the wrong way.

Still, he had to admit, the mental image of his masters as girls _was_ pretty damned funny.

Especially that of Kensei and the elder.

He couldn't help himself from wondering if the two would shave their facial hair if they were girls. But then quickly decided that they probably wouldn't.

Everyone else had caught Ichigo's brief look of disgust at the mention of marriage, and Kensei was single handedly trying to change her mind. Rambling at her that such a union was a _wonderful_ thing and wound up having his food stolen by Apachai- who noticed that the girl looked just a bit uncomfortable by the turn of conversation- when he wasn't paying attention.

He stopped trying to tell Ichigo about marriage then, yelled and began to chase Apachai around the dinning room while the others laughed at the funny spectacle that the two made.

Apachai eating his pilfered food. And Kensei chasing him around looking like an upset monkey that had just had his banana stolen from him.

Akisame looked at her out of the corner of his eye, taking note of the frown marring her face as she slowly put her chopsticks down and quietly excused herself from the table, and then stood up and walked away. Everyone went quiet at the abruptness of her leaving and once she was out of the room looked to Kenichi for some sort of an explanation.

Kenichi however didn't have an answer for them and merely said, "Don't look at me- I don't know what _that_ was about." Which was a lie. A somewhat terrible one.

But since he didn't want his masters to feel badly, then he figured that they didn't really need to know that.

"She seemed to dislike the mention of marriage." Shigure said around a bite of her food.

"I noticed that as well." Hayato said as he looked towards the door that the girl had left from.

Akisame made a thoughtful humming sound as Kensei frantically tried to tell them that he hadn't meant to offend her, he'd meant what he said to be considered as high praise. Not some messed up version of a hangman's noose or something.

Honestly, he'd _never_ seen a young girl react so unfavorably to the word 'marriage' before. So he didn't really know what to do to fix it. And that made him feel a little bit bad for possibly upsetting her.

Finally, Kenichi finished eating and set his own chopsticks aside and quickly told his masters not to think on it too much. He knew that Kensei hadn't meant anything upsetting by what he'd said, and he was betting that Ichigo knew that too. She was probably feeling a little bit overwhelmed by being around so many people at once. That was all.

His masters didn't really seem to believe his explanation any, but let him leave without elaborating anyways. Which was nice for a change since they usually tortured him for specifics.

Once he was outside, Kenichi went looking for his sister and found her sitting partially propped up on the porch in a nice, warm sunny spot just...looking around.

"Ichigo," He called out to her softly as he approached because he knew how she felt about having people sneak up on her and startle her. She turned her head to look at him as he reached out and settled his hand on top of her head and ruffled her dark hair. "I'm going to be going out for a little bit. Do you need me to stop by your place later and pick up anything for you? Books? Sketch pads? Paints? Tools? Magazines or catalogs?"

"I'm not sure. I brought some stuff with me, but Nijima said that he would pack up the rest of what I might need before I left. I just don't know how much of it he's gotten done."

"I'll swing by the house later and see for myself then. If he hasn't made any progress then I'll pack up some of your work stuff myself and bring it on over."

"Alright."

"Do you need me to grab your computer and stuff while I'm at it?"

"I brought my laptop. I just haven't hooked it up yet. I've been busy, nearly dying and all."

She meant it as a joke. But he didn't see any humor in the fact that she'd _actually_ nearly given herself a heart attack the day prior. He frowned at her choice of words and sighed as he removed his hand from her head and then knelt down so that the two of them were eye to eye.

"Don't try to joke about that. Do you have any idea how worried you had me and everyone else? I know that you aren't used to so many strange people and all, but you really upset Master Akisame yesterday. You should apologize for that. And while you're at it, apologize to Master Kensei for your behavior earlier. He wasn't trying to upset you any, and you hurt his feelings!"

"That wasn't my intention. I just wanted some peace and quiet. After all, it was pretty lively in there."

"Well he thinks that he upset you." Kenichi growled at her.

"He shouldn't be so sensitive. I know that he was giving me a compliment. So there's really nothing to be upset about."

"Well you didn't have to have such a look of disgust on your face."

 _"What?"_ She asked as she blinked at him.

"The expression that you made at the mention of the word marriage." Kenichi elaborated. She scrunched up her nose again at the word and he sighed, wondering if it was an automatic subconscious thing that she wasn't really aware of. "You're doing it again." He pointed out to her.

And earned a little growl of annoyance from her as she reached up and planted her hand on his face and gave him a small push away from her, causing him to fall on his butt.

"Shut up, jerk."

"Better a jerk than a stupid girl." Kenichi taunted. She glared at him and snarled,

"Don't make me get up and _hurt_ you boy."

He grinned at her knowing that more often than not; she was more bark than bite. Especially when it came to her family and friends.

"Yeah, yeah, you'll get me and my little dog too." He said mockingly as he got to his feet before saying, "I'm going to go now. I'll bring you back something to occupy yourself with. Just behave in the meantime, _please_."

"Fine, fine, get lost already."

"Okay, see you in a little bit."

"Stay safe, brat."

"Behave _savage_." He called out, and then laughed as she threw something at his head. She missed him, but not by much. And with that, he was off.


	9. Chapter 9

Everything was quiet for a little while after Kenichi ran off. Which was fine by her, really since it gave her some time to herself to think for a little bit.

Her adoptive brother's friends were a _strange_ lot.

His martial arts masters were equally strange as well. Though they certainly weren't the worst people that she'd ever met before. No- that particular placement went entirely to a select few of her worst enemies. Most of which were now dead, but had still left a lasting impression on her mind that had followed her through the years.

But Kenichi's...they all seemed like really good people regardless of their strangeness. Which was fantastic really.

She tended to get really tired of being the only freak of nature around nowadays. But she supposed that that was simply something that she was still adjusting too. Even now, years after the last fight that she'd ever been in while still a Soul Reaper- the last vestiges of her former power and might remained permanently imprinted on her heart and soul.

She had been supposed to return to normal once her power was gone, however her fight with Aizen had left her- though powerless when it came to her Soul Reaper abilities- significantly _altered_. Or perhaps, enhanced was the more appropriate word?

Physically at least.

Sure her Soul Reaper abilities were gone. And she was perfectly okay with that. Really she was. But even so, she still retained her inhuman strength, speed, and the lightening quick reflexes among other things that she had developed as a Reaper.

Because of this, and the fact that she had to now live her life as an ordinary human- she had decided to train herself as best as she could. Making sure to keep her combat prowess as _sharp_ as she could.

Just in case something should ever happen again. At least this way she wouldn't be considered a burden to anyone and could defend herself.

Though if not for the fact that her heart had been _damaged_ several times over the years- the last time being when she had attacked Soifon- the evening that her family had been killed.

It was such a nice day today that she might have decided to get up from the porch and do some training.

But seeing as she couldn't train at the moment, because she was still healing from her heart surgery, she would just have to content herself with simply sitting here like a lazy bum.

Sighing, she hung her head a little bit and nearly jumped out of her skin when someone walked up and sat down beside her on the porch. Lifting her head a little bit, she glanced at the person out of the corner of her eye and noted that it was the hulking blond man.

What did he call himself again? She knew that he had introduced himself at breakfast, but for the life of her she couldn't recall his name. _Urgh!_ Why was it so easy for her to learn fighting techniques, but so damned difficult for her to recall a person's name off the top of her head?

"My, that was a depressed sounding sigh." He said after a moment or so before asking kindly. "Are you alright, Ichigo?"

"I'm fine, sir." She said politely. The man regarded her skeptically for a moment. His eyes studying her intently to see if she was lying. Frankly, the longer he stared at her, the more she wanted to squirm.

The guy had eyes just like Kisuke's. Keen, intelligent...incredibly _uncomfortable_... She always felt as if he were trying to look into her soul whenever he stared at her like this, and she always had to grit her teeth to keep herself from snapping at him.

"My, it's a lovely morning. Isn't it?"

"Uh, y-yeah. It is."

"Perfect weather for doing something nice. Like maybe...building a nest on my porch, out of that blanket you have, so that you can enjoy the sun for a while?" She stiffened a little bit and ducked her head so that he couldn't see her embarrassed expression as he chuckled. "Don't think on it too much little one. I think I may start to smell smoke if you do." He teased.

She hummed instead of laughing like he had wanted her too.

"You certainly picked a nice place for your nest. It's nice and warm and sunny here."

"Yeah, it is." She agreed when the man suddenly blurted out.

"You aren't much of a talker, are you young lady?" She blinked at him, bewildered and he just grinned and patted her on the head and then got up and walked off. But not before ominously tossing out, "We'll see if we can change that some. You have a nice voice, Ichigo- it would be a shame if you didn't use it more."

Giving her flashbacks of the last time Orihime had had a severe sugar high and she had mistakenly visited her. _Alone._

All that Orihime had done for hours, upon hours and hours was talk until she finally conked out. And once she had put the girl to bed and slipped out of her apartment, the first thing that she'd done was mass text everyone to keep Orihime out of the sugar from now on.

Anyone who failed to comply wound up 'Orihime-sitting' because she wasn't going to do it anymore unless it was a matter of life or death. And yeah, she knew that that sounded terrible but in her defense- she'd honestly felt as if her ears were going to fall off or something.

So once she finally left the other girl's place, she'd spent the next four days camping out in Chad's living room. Basking in the awesome silence that simply seemed to immerse her best friend's home.

And Chad himself was never much of a talker unless he needed to be. So her was perfectly content to sit with her and _not_ speak.

"That's a happy face." She heard the same guy from this morning say as he walked up to her. She couldn't help herself, mentally imagining everyone (except for a select few people) taking a vow of silence pleased her immensely.

So she smiled a weird giddy sort of smile as he gracefully seated himself across from her.

He chuckled at her expression and muttered more to himself than her, "Definitely a happy face." Before then asking, "What are you thinking about to have such an expression? Is it something good?"

"It is for me." Was all that she could think to say. After all if she simply blurted out something about wanting people to be quiet- she was sure that he'd be rather offended. So she'd just keep that to herself.

"What did Hayato want to speak with you about?" He asked curiously. He'd seen the elder walk away from her a few minutes ago with a mischievous look on his face that simply didn't bode well for the girl.

If he could figure out what the elder intended, then he could nip the old man's plotting in the bud before he actually tried to plan something that might backfire on _all_ of them.

"He said something about my voice."

"Your voice?"

"I have a nice one, I should use it more."

"So basically he wants you to talk a little bit more?"

She shrugged her shoulder, "I guess."

He sighed and mulled something over for a moment before then saying, "I've sort of noticed that about you as well."

"Huh?"

"You don't speak much. And when you do speak- your _guarded_..."

"There's just some stuff that I simply don't like saying or talking about." She said.

He nodded his head in understanding and then asked, "Would it be alright with you if we continued our talk from before? You've covered your family. So I'm content to leave things as they are there out of respect for your feelings. But would you tell me a little bit about your friends now? I mean, Kenichi never mentioned any when he talked about you. You do have some, right?"

"I do."

He smiled, "Good. Will you tell me about them?"

"Sure. Let me see..." She got a thoughtful look on her face for a moment and then finally started. "The first friend that I ever had, was sort of more of a rival. We were both really young and I'd just started taking karate classes-"

He looked at her and asked curiously, "You were trained?"

"Some, yeah." She confirmed. "Of course, after my mom died, I had to quit so that I could take care of my sisters. But I managed to take classes every day for _months_ before that."

He hummed thoughtfully but kept his mouth shut as she told him about Tatsuki and how in karate class the two of them were always paired together and she'd punch her in the face.

He laughed in amusement as she told him that she finally got fed up with Tatsuki punching her in the face everyday. And the two of them _actually_ got into a knock down, drag out fight one day after school. She won. After which, Tatsuki decided that it wouldn't be good to punch her in the face anymore.

The next person that she told him about was Chad, since he was her second real friend. And aside from Rukia, he was definitely one of her favorites.

She didn't change the actual story of how they had met up much. She really didn't see much of a point in doing so. So she went ahead and told him that she'd been jumped by some gang members and how they had been holding her down when Chad accidentally happened upon them and froze up.

The guys had let go of her and attacked him, giving her just enough time to get up and take them out. After which, Chad had started following her around whenever he saw her out and about.

She told him about Rukia, and _yes_ \- she was smart enough to change that story up as much as possible. It wasn't as if she could simply come out and tell him that the other girl was a supernatural being. He'd think that she was crazy if she did.

So instead she simply told him that she had been lost, running away from her family who had some ties to a rogue military branch, and had broken into her home one night and scared her a little bit. They got into a cat fight of sorts, and she'd somehow wound up tied up on her bedroom floor with a mustache doodled on her face.

The two of them were pretty inseparable ever since. She wasn't totally sure that he'd bought that story. But it didn't particularly matter much since she'd gotten a little bit tired and had dozed off.

So she didn't get to tell him about the others. But that didn't seem to bother him any since he decided to let her sleep.


	10. Chapter 10

Akisame stayed where he was even after Ichigo had dozed off on him, mulling over everything that she'd told him so far. He was pretty good at being able to tell when a person was lying to him. However with her- he had some trouble being able to accurately read her.

Her facial expressions and body language was all over the place. Not only that, but her stories about her friends seemed a tad bit off too. Oh sure, he was fairly certain that she'd been totally honest about the first one, Tatsuki.

But the other two? He wasn't one hundred percent sure of.

It was odd but he had no problem mentally seeing a tiny Ichigo getting punched in the face everyday until she put a stop to it. But the stories of meeting her other two friends? Even he could tell that she was giving him the bare bones of explanations.

Her stories were lacking in a significant amount of detail.

And while he couldn't totally _not_ see her being jumped by gang members- much like Kenichi often was. I mean, they were siblings after all- like she'd mentioned being when she met her second friend. He just had some trouble _believing_ that she'd managed to take them out and save herself and the boy.

At least not without taking significant damage to herself in the process.

Still, he found himself a little bit of a mystery and now that he was intrigued enough, he wanted nothing more than to solve it. _Perhaps I should see if Nijima can dig something up on her._ The boy's information network was beyond impressive for a teenage boy. And he was fairly accurate as well.

If anyone could find out anything on her past- it would be him.

However he worried that if he asked him to look into her, the boy might refuse out of loyalty to her. Sighing because he wasn't exactly sure how to proceed here, he let his eyes drift a little bit from the yard to the girl.

She was partially propped up against one of the wooden beams, her blanket wrapped loosely around her slender shoulders, her head was turned ever so slightly which was causing her whole body to lean to the side a little bit. If she leaned much further there was no doubt in his mind that she would fall.

Deciding that he couldn't let her fall over due to her chest injury and the fact that it already hurt her a bit anyways, he reached out and grabbed her by the blanket and used that to gently move her so that she was lying down on her back with her head resting on one of his legs.

And as he started to pull his hands back he heard her let out a funny little sound of protest and froze as she muttered, "Dammit Rukia. Why do your drawings suck so bad- it's weird." Which was followed by a small whine before she muttered, "No, Orihime, not you too..."

Chuckling softly in amusement, he brushed her dark bangs back from her face and contented himself with simply letting her sleep while she dreamt strange things. After all, he had sort of forgotten that she tended to talk in her sleep.

So this was a good way to get answers about some stuff too. Even if it wasn't really what he wanted to know at the moment. The more she talked and said her friends names- the more he wanted to laugh. Even in her dreams, her friends sounded like terribly interesting people.

Maybe he could talk the elder into letting him adopt a few of them. For _entertainment_ purposes only. If he actually wanted children, he'd have to try his hand at dating and see where that led him.

* * *

Ichigo didn't wake up again until sometime after noon. And by then, she'd already been moved indoors and everyone was sitting down to eat some lunch.

She had been carefully placed in a nice sunny spot underneath a window which was a few feet away from the table and everyone and everything else. Akisame wasn't exactly sure what must have woken her.

It might have been Apachai enjoying his food rather loudly. Or it might have even been a semi-drunk Sakaki taking a bite out of some of the shrimp salad that she'd made earlier this morning and practically shouting, "Holy crap, this is good!" Before quickly devouring it.

"I know right!" Miu said with a small smile. "I think Ichigo and I should alternate fixing meals around here."

"That might not be such a bad idea. You both cook wonderfully." Kensei commented.

"But doesn't she dislike cooking?" Shigure asked. Akisame nodded his head in confirmation as he ate a bite of his own food.

"Yes, that is what she said."

"Well I think it's a splendid idea," Hayato said. "After all, the girl will need something to do around here to occupy here time."

"Doesn't she already have _two_ jobs though?" Miu asked, suddenly recalling that little tidbit of information and regretting opening up her mouth and putting ideas in the others heads. "I mean, Kenichi and I fixed up a work room for her and everything. Wouldn't two jobs keep her busy enough as it is?"

"Normally speaking, it would. But since one of her jobs is ghost writing- and we don't exactly know what the second one is... There will be days sometimes even weeks every so often where she'll be holed up in her work room or wherever working hard. On days like that, she'll be swamped with work and will probably not leave her room for quite a while. Not even to sleep or eat. If we want her to cook for us- we'll have to take full advantage of her while she's got nothing to do."

"That sounds terrible!" Sakaki said as he looked over at Kensei before then saying. "I love how you think." The older man just grinned at him.

"I know."

Ichigo may not have been totally awake enough to process what they were saying, but she heard her name a few times and rolled her eyes at their ridiculousness. She had enough on her plate to begin with as far as work was concerned. She had no time for the manipulations of others.

"You baka's do realize that I can hear you, right?"

Everyone at the table went totally quiet and still as she rolled over onto her side and slowly began to push herself up into a sitting position.

"Ichigo! You're awake!"

"Awake and hearing the lot of you plotting against me. Do you guys have any shame at all?"

All of the masters exchanged a look before blurting out in unison, _"No."_ Followed by Miu's questioning, "Should we?" Ichigo snorted and quickly covered her mouth to stifle her laugh though they still heard her anyways.

Everyone stared at her as she composed herself and then muttered more to herself than them, " _Un-frigging-believable_. I'd consign my soul to hell or something if I said things like that with such an unrepentant manner."

The men all snickered in amusement at how similar to Kenichi she sounded at the moment.

"Will you be joining us, Ichigo?" Miu asked curiously once she was sitting up.

Ichigo was quiet for a moment as she thought over the question. She didn't normally require more than two meals/snacks per day since she was usually always busy anyways. Mostly because of the staggeringly unbelievable energy reserves that she had developed these past few years.

And she'd already eaten once already- though it wasn't much since she hadn't really eaten everything on her plate this morning before deciding that it was too lively for her taste.

So maybe it couldn't hurt her to snack a little bit and skip this evenings meal. At least until they caught on to her anyways.

"Sure. I could go for a snack." She said as she got up and walked over to the table and then sat down next to Miu who smiled happily at her. She gave the girl an awkward looking smile of her own as she asked her what she wanted to eat.

Ichigo told her that she'd have some of the shrimp salad, some of the ginger spice and vanilla flavored awayukikan. Miu looked a little bit startled by how little she wanted, especially after putting all of that hard work into making everything earlier that morning.

Her grandfather and the other masters must have thought the small amount of food she wanted was a mite peculiar too. Each of them were currently watching the dark haired girl like a hawk. However none of them seemed to be about to say anything about it.

At least not yet anyways.

Miu kept a smile carefully pasted on her face as she quickly fixed the other girl her plate. "Do you want some tea to drink with it?" The blond asked politely as Ichigo slowly reached for her chop sticks and quietly replied that tea would be nice. And then politely thanked her before she took off to fix her a cup.

It wasn't long after she'd returned with her drink when Kenichi seemed to have finally returned, his voice calling out to alert them all to his return mere moments before he appeared in the dinning room. "Hey everyone!"

"Hello Kenichi, did you have fun on your outing?" Miu asked as he walked over to the table and sat down on the other side of Ichigo.

"Not really. I went to grab some of Ichigo's stuff so that she'll be able to occupy herself while she's healing." The boy said.

 _"Aww."_ Apachai said, looking bummed. He wasn't the only one to look depressed. Sakaki, the elder and Kensei looked pretty bummed to hear this too. "But Apachai thought that we had planned to have Ichigo cook more!"

Shigure reached out and patted the giant on the shoulder in a comforting manner as Kenichi looked questioningly at Akisame. The man sighed and merely cast a disappointed look at the other men and then said, "Pay no attention to them, Kenichi. So, you brought some more of Ichigo's things?"

"Yeah. I even made sure to grab her mail and bring it over too." Kenichi said as Miu handed him a plate so that he could grab some food since she very much doubted that he'd eaten anything while he was gone. He gave her a grateful look and then quickly grabbed himself some of the stuff on the table and then looked at his sister and then asked, "By the way, why do you label your mail such weird things?"

Ichigo gave him a innocent look. Pretending that she didn't know what he was talking about as Shigure asked him what he was talking about. At which point he explained that his sister tended to organize her mail according to weird labels. And then mentioned what those labels consisted of, mortifying the girl.

"She labels every piece of mail she gets under these weird labels that consist of, 'Death threats and Doom. Bill's and nonsense'. And last but not least, 'Oh! Fun!'."

Everyone went totally still again and looked at the girl, whom was hiding her face from them before then suddenly bursting into hysterical laughter. They'd heard a lot of weird things before, but none of them had ever heard of anyone labeling their mail quite like that before. So naturally it was funny to them.

Especially when Miu asked, " _Why_ do you label your stuff like that?"

"If you really want to know, grab a couple of things out of the 'Death threats and Doom' pile and the 'Oh! Fun!' pile. I guarantee you'll figure it out." Ichigo said in a defensive tone before then quickly finishing what little bit of food she had in front of her and then quickly excusing herself from the table.

Needless to say, everyone got more than a tad bit curious and made Kenichi go and grab a few things from both labels, and half an hour later, after reading what the boy had grabbed- they were freaking the hell out.

Apparently the Death threats and Doom stuff was very adequately named. Because Ichigo _literally_ got death threats from several different people. One was named Aizen, another was named Kenpachi- who sent little doodled pictures of him killing Ichigo. Deadpool style.

 _Creepy_.

And the last one was named Tatsuki. Though apparently her death threat was explained with the words, **You bitch! You made Orihime cry!** Which was followed by the words, **P.S. Call me as soon as you get this so that I can yell at you for not keeping in touch.**

The stuff from the Oh! Fun! pile wasn't too much better.

Though the letter suggesting a year long vacation in the mountains to play a long overdue game of 'survive my wrath' sounded a little bit fun to some of the masters.

But that was only because they were sadists and weird things appealed to them.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay- so since Ichigo can't tell people anything about being a former Soul Reaper- the official story of her...life, is a lot different.
> 
> Just roll with it.

They spent over three hours combing through the Death threats and Doom pile of stuff. Three _un-fucking-believable_ hours of nothing but incredibly graphic threats of bodily harm, and death threats against Ichigo! After which, Kenichi wound up on his hands and knees on the floor over a mind bogglingly high pile of letters and stuff _whining_.

"How? How could this have happened?! She's supposed to be the normal one!" The boy said in disbelief.

Kensei let out a small whistle as he set aside the latest letter that he'd been reading, dropping onto the pile next to Kenichi as Hayato said.

"I admire these people's dedication in the single minded and wanton destruction of another human being... But even I find this more than a little bit _ridiculous_. I mean, just how many people did your sister _upset_ Kenichi?"

Akisame responded autimatically. "Two thousand six hundred and ten." And the moment that he noticed everyone looking at him, he inwardly cringed and wondered if he shouldn't have answered the question at all.

"How the hell does a sixteen year old kid even piss off that many people?!" Sakaki asked in utter bewilderment as he slowly shook his head. Even _he_ had never pissed off that many people.

And he was eyeballs deep in gambling debts.

"I'm not sure," Hayato said. "I've lived nearly seventy seven years and even I don't have that many people out for _my_ blood. And that incudes some of the people who's families and friends I've had to kill."

"I'm not sure what impresses me more at the moment," Kensei said as he cast a weird glance at the pile of previously unread papers. "The fact that Ichigo is so young, and has apparently achieved more than I ever have in my lifetime. Or the fact that she has this many people actually hate her. Frankly I don't know what to do. Should I ask her for pointers? Take notes? Or simply sit back and watch the inevitable blood bath once it starts? What do you guys think?"

"Pointers." Shigure deadpanned with a nod of her head.

"Take notes!" Apachai said excitedly.

"I'd just be happy that I wasn't dragged into _this_ cluster fuck. I mean seriously, man- who the hell did we even let come into the dojo?" Sakaki muttered as he lifted his beer to his mouth and took a swallow.

"That's my sister your talking about, you _jerk_." Kenichi growled at the man as he lifted his head to glare at him. The karate master looked slightly taken aback by the look on the boy's face and quickly said in a defensive tone,

 _"What?"_ Before then tacking on a hasty, "I'm just telling it as I see it."

Kenichi actually bared his teeth and growled at the master. Like a rabid dog.

Sakaki's eyes widened ever so slightly in shock and he took a small step back. After all, if the kid lunged at him while in a mood like this, he might actually manage to land a few honest to god hits on him before the man stopped him.

"Now, now," Miu said as she placed a hand on Kenichi's back and patted it a few times. "I'm sure that there's a perfectly good-" She shot the others a dark look and then said, "And _reasonable_ , explanation for all of this." She patted his back a few more times in what she hoped was a comforting manner as she eyed the pile of threats against Kenichi's sister and couldn't help but wonder just how many of them were serious threats and how many weren't.

Those weird doodles of someone killing the girl were just...well, _creepy_. Also, they looked like they were drawn by a little kid. So it was really hard to take those totally seriously.

"Hmm. You know, I was thinking earlier about asking Nijima to look up some stuff about Ichigo. Perhaps we should go ahead and give him a call?" Akisame said.

Kenichi opened his mouth to snap, _hell no_ , at the man. Because the last thing he wanted was Nijima looking into his sister's past and possibly finding something that he could use as blackmail material. But before he could even say anything, the elder and other masters were all agreeing with his suggestion.

Which just plain sucked, in Kenichi's opinion. But he supposed that there wasn't really any true harm in it since there was absolutely no possible way that Ichigo could have actually pissed this many people off.

It just _wasn't_ possible.

* * *

It barely took Nijima thirty minutes to get to the dojo after Akisame called him. And when he finally showed up- he came prepared. He had his PDA, and a box of what looked like DVD's in his hands too.

He'd already gotten a dinner invite from Miu, so there was no real concern whatsoever about him overstaying his welcome for at least a few hours.

And no one had to worry much about Ichigo at present since she had locked herself away in her 'work' room to do stuff. So they had more than enough time to snoop and delve to their hearts content. Which was unfortunate- from Kenichi's point of view.

Even he knew that Ichigo _had_ secrets. There wasn't a person alive that didn't.

However because she was currently staying at the dojo, the masters obviously felt that she wasn't entitled to keeping them. Just in case some of those letters she got _were_ serious threats. He understood very well that they had a right to be...uh, _concerned_.

To be perfectly honest, he had some of his own after reading some of those letters.

However he really didn't think that this was the best way to go about alleviating themselves of those concerns. Especially when it was at Ichigo's expense.

"Alright, I'm here. What's up?" Nijima said as he walked into the room with his box of DVD's and PDA in tow.

"Thank you for coming over so quickly Nijima." Hayato said politely. "The other masters and I have a few concerns about Ichigo-"

The dark haired boy got a strangely worried look on his face and quickly asked, "Is she okay?"

"She's fine for the moment." Akisame said. "She's already holed up in her work room with some of the stuff that Kenichi brought over for her, working."

The look of relief that flitted across his face had Kenichi's head cocking in a questioning manner. Something in his brain already nagging at him before he realized exactly what it was. _Nijima already knows everything._ He wasn't really sure how to feel about that considering the fact that Ichigo was his sister and yet she hadn't spoken so much as a peep about _anything_.

Sadly, he wasn't the only person in the room to realize this fact. Akisame realized it too and promptly dropped the polite act to demand to know what the boy knew.

Nijima balked. Like physically _balked_ at being confronted about knowing something about Ichigo that they didn't. And simply glanced from one face to another and then back at the door longingly.

"I understand your reluctance to tell us anything Nijima, however as long as Ichigo is here- if there's anything that we need to know- you should tell us. It'll end badly for everyone if something is suddenly sprung on us and someone gets hurt. Right?" Akisame said coaxingly.

Shockingly, Nijima snarled at him. Telling him to damn his logic.

Which earned him a startled look from the man as well as the others. Probably because they'd never been on the receiving end of his ire and frustration. Mostly because they had never asked him to tell them anything that would and could possibly put him in danger.

But they weren't putting him in a very good position here for a multitude of reasons that he didn't want to even bring up. But to simplify things a bit- On one hand, knowing stuff was literally his bread and butter.

And on the other- hello- _loyalty_. Ichigo had his unwavering loyalty, which was rare considering he didn't really like aligning himself with anyone. But then he also didn't like being asked to nark on her to others about her past.

He didn't give much of a damn if Kenichi hated him. But he didn't want _her_ to hate him any.

He was about to turn around and stomp off to head back home when he heard Ichigo say tiredly from somewhere behind him. "Just tell them what they want to know, Nijima."

He turned his head to look at the girl over his shoulder, and narrowed his eyes at her. Noting that she looked far more exhausted then she probably should have at the moment. For god's sake, she looked as if she hadn't rested any in a month! How was that even possible?

She'd only been here for like two days now. She shouldn't look so damn worn down and weary! He thought with a vague sense of alarm as he turned and reached out and quickly wrapped his arms around her as if he were worried that she'd suddenly collapse or something and he just wanted to keep her from falling.

She stood totally still for a moment before sighing and resting her chin on his shoulder as he asked, "Are you sure?"

"No. Not really." She said honestly. Her voice hushed enough to sound like she was mumbling.

He nodded his head a little bit in understanding. After all, as crazy as the 'official' explanation for her past was, even he knew that a good portion of it was deeply rooted in the truth. However the unofficial version was much, _much_ crazier. Even he wasn't certain if he totally believed it.

But then...Ichigo didn't really have any reason to lie to him about the actual events of her past.

"Alright," He sighed as he gave her a slight squeeze before slowly releasing her. "Alright. I'll tell them." She nodded her head, her expression one of grim determination before she then turned and left the room again.

Maybe to go somewhere quiet and hide?

Sighing, Nijima ran a clawed hand through his short hair and then turned to the others and muttered, "Alright. Let's start at the beginning." Walking over to the table, he seated himself at the very end, across from Hayato and then said, "Everything started with the death of Ichigo's mother, Misaki."

"Huh? I thought that Ichigo's mom died in a wrong time, wrong place kind of thing." Kenichi said with confused look.

"That's the official story, yes. However it wasn't what _really_ happened." Nijima said with a sad shake of his head. Everyone got quiet and focused on him as he started talking. "Anyways, everything started with Misaki's death. Apparently the woman and her husband had caught the attention of a madman who firmly believed that some people were closer to being gods than others because they were born stronger or...just plain _different_."

"Anyways, he got it into his head that if Misaki and Isshin got together then they're differences would blend well and pass on to their children. He wasn't totally wrong. But he wasn't totally right either. Misaki had a form of psychic ability that allowed her to know things automatically. She even had _documented_ cases of actual precognition based events. Isshin was a military man- special forces. And had his own abilities."

"And when they got together and had children...the madman was there. Secretly watching every single thing that each of them did to see if their children had the abilities that he believed they would inherit. Ichigo, wasn't just the first born to the happy couple. She's a _literal_ manifestation of everything that the madman was hoping for."

_"Huh?!"_

"Look, Ichigo was born special like both of her parents. She possesses the naturally evolved abilities that her parents lacked."

"I'm sorry but what exactly does that mean?" Miu asked all of a sudden.

"I means that she was born _enhanced_ , Miu." Nijima said as he rubbed at the spot between his eyes, feeling the ominous throbbing ache of a headache beginning to form somewhere behind his eyes. "Ichigo is far faster, stronger, and mentally able to solve problems and handle things that we- as ordinary people- cannot. When I say that she's enhanced, what I mean is that she can literally have a frigging mountain dropped on her head, and still manage to pick it up and chuck it somewhere away from her. All without breaking a sweat. It's ridiculous really."

"T-That's insane! There's no way that-" Kenichi started to say that he was lying to them but the look that Nijima sent his way quickly had him backpedaling. After all, why would he lie to them?

"I have literal proof that she can do it." Nijima snapped at him as he slammed the box of DVD's down on the table. Causing the clear plastic cases to clatter. "Those videos were pilfered from the madman's secret lab by Ichigo herself when she went to stop him. I've looked at all of them, and studied them, and even had them tested for CGI. I'm telling you- she _can_ do it. And if you don't believe me, see for yourself."

"I believe that we'll do that Nijima," Hayato said as he reached over and collected the box and moved it to his side of the table before then asking, "Now, please tell us more about...the madman? Didn't you just say that he had a lab of some sort?"

"His name is Sosuke Aizen. Former militray- the same branch that Isshin Kurosaki served with. Science division. He was an inventor that branched out into weapons and chemical warfare. But in his spare time, he was a sociopath who _delighted_ in not only ruining lives, but taking them as well."

"According to his records he was caught, after more than twenty years of mass murder, having affiliations to terrorist organizations, human experimentation, war crimes as well as crimes against humanity. He's currently rotting in the deepest darkest pit that the government could find to contain him, serving out several life sentences."

"Okay, so he was obsessed with Ichigo because she's different. How exactly did the guy get caught?" Miu wondered aloud.

Nijima gave them his evilest smirk as he said, "That's simple. He orchestrated an incident where your sister and a few of her classmates and friends were all almost killed. It was only a matter of time before Ichigo found him after that. The very second that he showed his face to her- he was a goner."

"She went after him with absolutely _everything_ that she had and then some. Honestly, it's beyond mindboggling the lengths that your sister will go to to make an evil lunatic like Aizen utterly _miserable_. I have to applaud her dedication. Of course, I also hope to never wind up on her bad side. She makes the masters look like harmless little angels by comparison."


	12. Chapter 12

_"So Ichigo actually went after this...Aizen ya-hoo?" Sakaki asked again for clarification. Because like the others, he was finding it hard to believe that a little girl would go after someone- a lunatic with military training, and affiliations with terrorist organizations no less._

_Honestly he was having a hard time wrapping his head around what he was hearing. And from the grim looks on some of the other master's faces, they were having a hard time believing what they were hearing too._

_Nijima nodded his head again. "She did." Nijima said grimly. His expression reflecting something...dark that he must have been thinking of. "To be honest, he didn't really give her much of a choice in the matter."_

_"Oh? How so?"_

_"He tried to recruit her to work for him."_ _Everyone was eerily silent for a heartbeat or so. "And when she refused...he went after her friends, classmates, and a bunch of innocent people. She blamed herself for everyone who got hurt. So she did the only thing that she could think of-"_

_"She fought back knowing that he wasn't going to stop." Akisame said, his expression thunderous as Nijima nodded his head._

_"Yes. And believe me- it wasn't easy for her. She had a lot going against her. Her age, being untrained... She practically threw herself into a lion's den full of heavily armed, and superiorly trained people."_

_"How did she manage to survive? I mean, even I couldn't do something like that! And I've been trained by grandpa since I was a toddler." Miu asked._

_"As I said before, she makes the master's look like little angels by comparison. What she lacks in skill, she more than makes up in sheer brute force and brutality. She's inventive too. Freakishly so. But if you really want to see what she can do-" He pointed a clawed finger to the box of DVD's. "Those contain bits and pieces of her life since before everything happened. Before her mother's death, Aizen- all of it. But if you're really curious then I'd start watching at disc ten. And move on to disc thirteen, and then seventeen through the rest of them. In that order."_

* * *

Nijima left sometime after dinner, after hooking up the positively ancient TV so that Kenichi, Miu and the masters could delve into the DVd's unhindered.

However, unlike Nijima's suggestion to start with a specific disk number- the masters wanted to be as thorough as possible and wound up watching _all_ of them.

The first of which were fairly boring and consisted of Ichigo as a toddler, laughing, playing and...staring blankly into space from time to time and talking to herself? But gradually over the next few video's, Kenichi, Miu and the others began to see a little bit of what Nijima was talking about. _Ability wise_.

Ichigo truly was a very unique and special child. While on the surface, she appeared to be just like any other young child between the ages of two and ten. However, unlike so many other children- she possessed a certain knowledge and awareness of the world that people didn't usually see in such young children.

She knew it all. The good, the bad, the ugly and _everything_ else in-between.

As far as each of them knew, a vast majority of children were usually protected from this.

So in one video where she appeared to be around five or so, when she walked up to a policeman and pointed somewhere off screen and said, "The baby is hurt." The man had been quick to react because he thought that there was an actual baby that was somewhere nearby, injured.

What he found was a mangled and half eaten corpse that had sparked an investigation into the death of the child. He had even taken little Ichigo and questioned her about what she had seen.

Whatever she told him, led to the arrest of a monster. A pedo that had preyed upon and murdered his victims. The news paper clippings alone was testimony to that.

The next video was almost just as bad. _Almost_ , being the operative word.

Little Ichigo seemed to literally be tripping over bodies that no one else seemed to even _know_ about. And the weirdest thing about such instances was that the damned child was never anywhere near the spots where the bodies were found!

In one video she even predicted a couple of earthquakes, a land slide, and bombing that took place in different parts of the world- yet was on the evening news mere hours later. And after seeing that she was right; she grabbed the TV remote from what they all could only assume was one of her parents hands and muted the TV and asked, "What's wrong with me?"

Because apparently even at the age of...five? Six maybe? She was already incredibly aware of the fact that she was _vastly_ different from other children. However the fact that she would even think that something like her abilities were wrong, was... _alarming_. Sad even.

But they supposed that if they experienced the ability to literally trip over corpses and predict disasters then they all might think that there was something probably seriously wrong with themselves too.

Seeing a woman get up from the couch, Kenichi muttered in awe. "Oh wow, that must be Misaki."

"Ichigo's mom?" Miu asked as he nodded his head before she then said. "She's so pretty."

They watched as the woman wrapped her arms around little Ichigo and pet her short hair comfortingly as she said, "Sweetheart, there's nothing wrong with you."

At which point little Ichigo roughly pushed the woman away and then motioned with her hand towards the news of the incidents and then asked in a disbelieving tone. "Are we even watching the same thing here? To my knowledge, other children can't predict disasters all the way across the world. So don't sit there and lie to me as if I'm stupid, mom. Something is clearly _wrong_ with me, and I want to know what."

The way that the girl spoke was _odd_ to them at first.

But then Kenichi pointed out that the way that Ichigo was speaking was different from other kids her age. She spoke like an adult. Whereas most children her age would speak softer, with an element of innocence that she had either lost- or was simply suppressing at the time.

Kensei voiced his thoughts on the matter and firmly believed that she lost it while tripping over bodies years earlier, and though Kenichi was loathe to admit it, his master was probably right.

Misaki had no answer for little Ichigo as far as what was wrong with her went. So the girl threw the TV remote aside and walked off to be alone.

In the next video, Ichigo was older. And from the looks of things, her mother had been dead for a while. She looked like she was nearly eleven or so, and had grown considerably. Her hair was the same color as her late mother's. A nice blend of strawberry blond with an orange hue to it. It was short like a boy's, and looked just as wild.

She even dressed like a boy instead of like the young lady that she was. She even walked and moved in a mannish manner.

But that was neither here nor there.

In this particular video, she was surrounded by running and screaming people on all sides. They could hear a series of loud booms, see the ominous red-orange of fire, and heard the near deafening sounds of shattering glass and something incredibly heavy falling not far away from her.

She ran ahead instead of running away like anyone with common sense would. And just barely skidded to a stop when half of a marble building collapsed into the street in front of her, narrowly escaping possible serious injury or even death.

However even the idea of being hurt or killed didn't seem to deter her from moving ahead again.

In fact, they could clearly hear people calling for help. And sure enough, the girl threw herself into the mess and started grabbing people- the injured, the dying- their state didn't matter all that much as long as she managed to get them to safety.

And this was even where Nijima's remark about having something fall on her head came into play. While evacuating some of the people- a huge building came crashing down on top of her.

There was a brief flicker of surprise on her face before she appeared to be crushed underneath the heavy weight of stone and steel. However it didn't seem to have hurt her all that much.

A few bruises, a bloody gnash on one of her cheeks and right above one of her eyes. And that seemed to be it.

The next few shots of the video consisted of her lifting up and tossing aside several tons of broken, jagged, and partially melted materials and then looked around- possibly for anyone else that needed assistance- and upon finding none left, went on her way as if nothing had happened.

The next video was one of the ones that Nijima had told them to start with.

Disk ten, had video of Ichigo and a small, petite black haired beauty with wide violet colored eyes. And the moment that the girl said the others name, recognition flickered to life in Akisame's pale eyes.

"Rukia."

"What?"

"Rukia. That small girl is one of Ichigo's friends." Akisame said as they watched the video of the two together.

At first it was a little bit difficult to tell if the two girls liked each other or hated each other. Rukia would _punch_ Ichigo for just about any perceived slight imaginable. However instead of getting _irked_ or even _pissed_ about always being the smaller girl's punching bag, the taller girl would just laugh as if it were the funniest thing in the world to rile the other girl up.

This particular video had the kids on a school trip into the mountains for 'survival training'. Which was probably something P.E. related since having a bunch of kids out in the woods for any other reason was just plain wrong.

Ichigo was standing in line next to Rukia with the leather shoe lace to one of her shoes in her mouth, and seemed to be chewing on it as everyone else listened to someone telling them what they were going to be doing. Which was learning to survive some weird apocalyptic scenario where they were the last of human kind and had to 'survive' off of the land.

Which meant, hunting, tracking, killing their own food, making a camp, camp fire and a bunch of other stuff. And to be even meaner about it, they were being graded on how they preformed.

Ichigo still stood there chewing on her shoe lace like a goat. While several people on either side of her couldn't stop laughing about something.

Finally whoever had taken them on the trip decided that they had talked enough and told the kids to scamper off, however before any of them could so much as take a step Rukia raised her hand and asked if the person in charge could please get ichigo to stop gnawing on her shoe lace like a crazy person.

Ichigo countered by raising her hand after being told to spit the shoe lace out and said, "A little warning before everyone runs off. We're over three hundred miles away from the nearest signs of civilization, any medical care facility, and help should anyone truly need it. So when you are out here, trying to learn how to survive- you are literally taking your lives into your own hands. That being said-" She cast her little friend a devilish look and grinned as the dark haired girl suddenly ducked her head to hide her amusement as she went on to say. "As someone who is standing here chewing on a shoe lace like a goddamned crazy person- out here it's literally survival of the fittest. And for any of you stupid enough not to understand what I mean, I'll dumb it down for you. Any of you that fall down and don't get back up will be considered _fair game_."

"And for those of you that still don't get it- _I will eat you_. I can't say it any clearer than that. Out here, the weak die for a reason. So please, run off willy nilly and _don't_ pay attention to where you're going. Because I'm already hungry and you people are nothing but meat to me."

She smiled at everyone and they could clearly see the nervous looks that she was getting from her fellow students as they suddenly heard someone say, "Change in plan! Lets go home and eat cheese burgers!"

The kids didn't even grumble or put up a fight. Which was just a little bit disappointing to the masters, especially since they wanted to see just how dedicated to the 'I will eat you' that she had said a few minutes prior.

The kids did however practically _run_ away from Ichigo.

Leaving her behind with Rukia and several others who were all laughing hysterically as she finally pulled her shoe lace from her mouth and knelt down to lace her shoe up again looking incredibly pleased with herself.

"Aww, what are we going to do about survival training now?" Another girl asked in a bummed tone once she finally finished laughing.

Ichigo finished up relacing her shoe and then stood back up and slung an arm around Rukia's slender shoulders and just smiled as she said, "We'll come back over the weekend and play a nice long game of night tag."

"Night tag?" The girl asked curiously as a boy with glasses chimed in.

"What about survival training?"

"Night tag can double as survival training." Ichigo said easily. Not the least bit worried about any sort of survival training. "Because you haven't lived until you've run through this area when it's pitch black outside and you can't see jack."

"Have you run through the area while it's dark out?" The same boy with the glasses asked.

"No. But think of it this way, at least if I get taken out by a tree limb or something- the rest of you have a more decent chance of making it out of the woods. Or ending up like me before the night is over...it really goes both ways."

"Fifty-fifty huh?"

"I'm in." A boy who looked like he was nearly as tall as Hayato said as he leaned down a little bit so that he was eye level with the girl.

Ichigo grinned and hollered, "Yay! Chad's in! This is going to be so much fun!"

"Yay! Count me in!" The other girl cheered. Rukia joined in soon after while the boy in glasses looked at the others doubtfully, and then sighed.

"Alright. I guess I'm in too."

After which the kids all loaded themselves onto a bus with their other schoolmates and got cheese burgers before they were all dropped off at home.

There was a brief time skip after that before the video started back five days after the 'survival trip'. Everyone was standing on a ledge on the side of a small mountain that overlooked the large wooded area below.

Ichigo was looking over the ledge at the woods below with a slightly mischievous gleam in her eyes as the others all walked over to her and checked the area out for themselves. Barely ten minutes later Ichigo was laying out the rules to the game of night tag. And before she could even finish a truck appeared with several other people.

Three or more of whom looked like adults.

A platinum blond guy in a striped hat walked over with a couple of kids, a woman, and a few others and invited themselves to the game.

However there was one alteration. The man decided that he was going to pit his people against Ichigo and the others. And he came _armed_ with actual weapons.

Katana's, gloves, a missile launcher with a dozen or so mini missiles, knives, a bow and arrows and a few other things were handed out amongst everyone. All of them equally as _deadly_ as everything else, after which the kids all threw themselves over the ledge and disappeared into the woods below.

Everything got quiet for a little while after that. But it didn't last for long since the little girl with the missile launcher blew up half of the damned trees and everything else with them in an effort to flush Ichigo and her friends out.

It didn't work though. _Thank god._

However after a while, each and every one of the kids were found and everyone engaged in some sort of fighting. And to be honest, none of them were half bad.

Rukia wasn't shabby with a sword. Neither was Ichigo for that matter.

Though the smaller girl was given a traditional katana that suited her size and build. While Ichigo somehow wound up toting around this _monstrous,_ wicked looking black bladed sword that was as long as she was tall, and as wide as her torso.

The damned thing didn't even have a proper handle or guard on it! Hell, it didn't even have a sheath for her to put it away in!

But that wasn't the truly surprising part. The truly surprising part was just how well she managed to use it, and maneuver with it so easily that was _really_ baffling to them. She could lift it with one hand- despite the obviously heavy weight of it. And could run faster than a normal person could even with it weighing her down.

It was incredible. But not nearly as incredible as what she could do with it when she fought.

She and the blond guy squared off and nearly killed each other.

The two of them were laying in the middle of a totally ruined and burning clearing. The man was swearing up a blue streak and then some, sounding thoroughly disgruntled and shockingly enough- _pissed._

"Jesus, fuck! I can't believe you would do something so- I mean, what the hell?! Were you trying to signal space Batman? _Goddamn_." He shouted as he slowly got to his feet and looked around at the damage that the two of them had caused.

Ichigo didn't move a muscle. She did however laugh hysterically when they both heard someone shout in a slightly panicked tone, "Kisuke! Have the aliens finally landed? _Is the invasion starting?!_ "

To which the blond man threw his hands up and shouted back, "That's what I'm trying to figure out!"


End file.
